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Amanda Williams (artist)

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Amanda Williams
Born1974
Evanston, IL
NationalityAmerican
Websiteawstudioart.com

Amanda Williams (born 1974) is a visual artist based in Bridgeport, Chicago. Williams grew up in Chicago's South Side and trained as an architect.[1] Her work investigates color, race, and space while blurring the conventional line between art and architecture.[2] She has taught at the California College of the Arts in San Francisco, Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts at Washington University in St. Louis,[3] Illinois Institute of Technology,[4] and her alma mater Cornell University.[5] Williams has lectured at the Metropolitan Museum of Art,[6] New Museum,[7] School of the Art Institute of Chicago,[8] and at a TED conference.[9]

Early life and education

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Williams was born in Evanston, Illinois[10] and grew up in the Auburn-Gresham neighborhood in the South Side of Chicago, attending the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools for high school.[11][12] She received her Bachelor of Architecture from Cornell University in 1997, where she was a member of the Quill and Dagger society,[5] and worked for a commercial architecture firm in San Francisco for six years before returning to Chicago to pursue art full-time.[1]

Career and Important Works

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William's work deals with the intersection of race, urban space, and color[2] and is heavily influenced by her background as an architect. While enrolled at Center Program in Chicago, Williams felt unsatisfied with paint on canvas, and was challenged by visiting critic Tricia van Eck to enlarge the scale of her work[1] to match her architecture.

In addition to large works, Williams has installed an exhibition at the Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York. The work titled What Black is This, You Say? is a response to the movement for black lives spurred by the murder of George Floyd.[13]

Color(ed) Theory

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Her most famous project, Color(ed) Theory, which debuted at the Chicago Architecture Biennial in 2015, was met with critical acclaim for its confrontational look at race and space in the South Side of Chicago. Between 2014 and 2016, Williams repainted eight vacated and condemned houses in the Englewood neighborhood with the help of friends and family members. The artist chose eight colors she felt best represented black consumer culture specific to the South Side of Chicago, including Harold's Chicken Shack red, Newport 100's teal, Crown Royal Bag purple, Flamin’ Hot Cheetos orange, Ultrasheen conditioner blue, Pink Oil moisturizer, Currency Exchange yellow, and Safe Passage yellow.[14] The bright colors converted the desolate, abandoned homes into sculptural objects, drawing attention to the issue of underinvestment in black communities and the corresponding decline of those neighborhoods.[15] The project was displayed as a series of photographs.

Uppity Negress

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Part of The Arts Club of Chicago Garden Projects, Uppity Negress is a site specific, exterior installation. Positioned in the intermediate space between public and private, the installation addresses accessibility and authority in urban space. The piece engages the existing fence with a secondary fence that breaks away and deconstructs itself from the original boundary. Through the process of de-familiarization, Williams begins to question the connotations that fences hold and their dual function as both containers and barriers, particularly, in relation to gender and race. Referencing the contemporary usage of the term "uppity negress", Williams creates a disorienting space with a deformed fence referencing black women's place in the city.[16]

Chicago Works: First Solo Exhibition (MCA Chicago)

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For her first solo-show, which ran in the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, from July 18 to December 31 in 2017, the artist presented work responding to changes in contemporary urban spaces. The show featured sculptures and photography that focused on the relationship between context and material value. Williams asked viewers to consider the social, political and racial narratives which contribute to the devaluation of a neighborhood. Although her work focused specifically on neighborhoods on Chicago's South Side, the ideas are applicable to nearly every modern urban landscape.[17]

Williams’ gold brick installations that were featured in the show examined the evolution of urban landscape and questioned the legitimacy of how we assess the value of architecture in declining neighborhoods.[18] With the help of family members and friends, William's painstakingly painted imitation gold-leaf onto locally sourced bricks from the demolished remains of the Color(ed) Theory houses. In It’s a Gold mine/ Is the Gold Mine? a stack of bricks painted gold are displayed on an artist-made pallet.[15] By using bricks from demolished buildings, Williams attaches commercial and conceptual value to salvaged material deemed useless in their previous contexts. Painting them gold and leaving them on display in art museums adds another level of prestige and merit to the objects’ worth,[15] alluding to the historic significance of the "gold standard." William plays with desire and access in She’s Mighty Mighty, Just Letting’ It All Hang Out, where a golden brick wall completely blocks off one of the gallery entrances. There was also a room barred by stacks of gold bricks, inaccessible to viewers aside from a small opening, although William's arranged for residents of Englewood to have exclusive access to it.[18] The gold bricks were an extension of her project Color(ed) Theory, and highlight how demolition and renewal can shape the lives of urban populations, raising difficult questions about social and political undertones in Chicago.[17]

Cadastral Shaking

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For the inauguration of Lori Lightfoot's mayoral office in Chicago, the Smart Museum of Art loaned Cadastral Shaking (Chicago v1), part of a series of screen and relief prints that Williams journalist Natalie Y. Moore based on maps of Chicago created by the Federal Housing Administration that began the practice of redlining.[19]

She Built NYC

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Amanda Williams, with Olalekan Jeyifous, was awarded the commission for the public monument that will honor Shirley Chisholm, slated for Prospect Park, Brooklyn on April 24, 2019.[20][21]

What black is this you say?

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From November to December 2020, William presented a series of multi-platform, color artwork at the Rhona Hoffman Gallery,[22] in Chicago. This was an informal response to #Blackout Tuesday, a social media movement in protest of the murder of George Floyd. Through this artwork, she wanted to explore the plurality, complexity and nuance of the shade, in relation to the Black experience.[23]

Selected exhibitions

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Solo exhibitions:

2017:

2015:

  • of REQUIEMS and RELIQUARIES: work by AMANDA WILLIAMS - Chicago Art Department, Chicago, IL[27]

Group exhibitions:

2019:

2018:

2016:

  • At First I Left Messages In the Street (curated by Allison Glenn), Chicago, IL[31]

2015:

Recognition/Awards/Fellowships

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References

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  1. ^ a b c Waxman, Lori. "Suddenly, artist Amanda Williams is everywhere". chicagotribune.com. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  2. ^ a b "This Revolutionary Architect-Artist Is Gearing Up to Be a Household Name | Architectural Digest". Architectural Digest. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  3. ^ "Williams and Hernandez discuss PXSTL | The Source | Washington University in St. Louis". The Source. 2017-02-23. Retrieved 2018-03-14.
  4. ^ "Amanda Williams, Architecture Adjunct Associate Professor, Wins 2014 3Arts Award". iit.edu. 3 November 2014. Retrieved 2018-03-14.
  5. ^ a b "Amanda Williams | Cornell AAP". aap.cornell.edu. Retrieved 2018-03-14.
  6. ^ "In Our Time: A Year of Architecture in a Day". The Metropolitan Museum of Art, i.e. The Met Museum. Retrieved 2018-03-14.
  7. ^ "IdeasCity". www.newmuseum.org. Retrieved 2018-03-14.
  8. ^ Amanda Williams, 9/10/18 - SAIC's Visiting Artists Program Lecture, retrieved 2021-04-28
  9. ^ Williams, Amanda (19 March 2019), Why I turned Chicago's abandoned homes into art, retrieved 2021-04-28
  10. ^ "Amanda Williams". Rhona Hoffman Gallery. Retrieved November 18, 2020.
  11. ^ "Designer of the Moment: Amanda Williams". Newcity Design. 2016-03-10. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  12. ^ "Chicago's most significant cultural export isn't Chance". Crain's Chicago Business. 2018-04-12. Retrieved 2019-04-18.
  13. ^ "Storefront for Art and Architecture's What Black Is This, You Say? challenges "monolithic representation"". The Architect’s Newspaper. 2021-04-28. Retrieved 2021-05-22.
  14. ^ "Why Amanda Williams Painted This Building the Color of Flamin' Hot Cheetos". Chicago magazine. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  15. ^ a b c "Chicago Works: Amanda Williams at The Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago". ArchDaily. 2017-09-21. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  16. ^ a b "The Arts Club of Chicago » Amanda Williams: Uppity Negress". www.artsclubchicago.org. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  17. ^ a b c "Chicago Works: Amanda Williams". MCA. Retrieved 2018-03-14.
  18. ^ a b "Why a Chicago Artist Is Connecting Blight to Gold Bricks". Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  19. ^ "New Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot's First Order of Business Was to Hang This Powerful Artwork About 'Redlining' in Her Office". artnet News. 2019-05-21. Retrieved 2019-05-22.
  20. ^ "News and Press Releases". www1.nyc.gov. Retrieved 2020-02-14.
  21. ^ Steinhauer, Jillian (2019-04-23). "The Shirley Chisholm Monument in Brooklyn Finds Its Designers". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-02-14.
  22. ^ "Amanda Williams - Exhibitions - Rhona Hoffman Gallery". www.rhoffmangallery.com. Retrieved 2021-05-22.
  23. ^ "What black is this you say? A public artwork by Amanda Wlliams". 28 April 2021. Archived from the original on 2021-05-22. Retrieved 2021-05-22.
  24. ^ "A Way, Away (Listen While I Say) - Pulitzer Arts Foundation". Pulitzer Arts Foundation. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  25. ^ "off the wall | Monique Meloche Gallery". moniquemeloche.com. Archived from the original on 2018-04-15. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  26. ^ "City of Chicago :: 50x50 Neighborhood Arts Project". www.cityofchicago.org. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  27. ^ "of REQUIEMS and RELIQUARIESby Amanda WilliamsJune 12-July 2CAD East « Chicago Art Department". www.chicagoartdepartment.org. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  28. ^ Moore, Natalie (18 January 2019). "On the grounds of an old steel mill, could Chicago create a piece of utopia?". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved 9 March 2019.
  29. ^ Gettinger, Aaron (25 February 2019). "At the Smart, 'Solidary & Solitary' shows individuals progressing Black art". hpherald.com. Hyde Park Herald. Archived from the original on 28 February 2019. Retrieved 9 March 2019.
  30. ^ Gayduk, Jane (2018-06-01). "Shine a Light: At the Venice Architecture Biennale, U.S. Entries Tackle Citizenship, Visibility". ARTnews.com. Retrieved 2020-03-14.
  31. ^ "Home". in the beginning, sometimes i left messages in the street. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  32. ^ "Search – Chicago Architecture Biennial". 2015.chicagoarchitecturebiennial.org. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  33. ^ "Columbia College Chicago : Vacancy: Urban Interruption and (Re)generation". students.colum.edu. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  34. ^ Stevens, Matt (12 October 2022). "MacArthur Foundation Announces 25 New 'Genius' Grant Winners". The New York Times. Retrieved 12 October 2022.
  35. ^ cwarltier, Community Contributor. "Leadership Greater Chicago (LGC) Announces 2018 Class of Fellows". chicagotribune.com. Retrieved 2018-03-12. {{cite news}}: |first= has generic name (help)
  36. ^ "United States Artists » Amanda Williams". www.unitedstatesartists.org. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  37. ^ Kamin, Blair. "Chicago designers announced for 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale". chicagotribune.com. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  38. ^ "Obama Foundation Announces Exhibition Designers for Obama Presidential Center - Obama Foundation". Obama Foundation. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  39. ^ Foundation, Joan Mitchell (14 November 2017). "Artist Programs » Artist Grants". joanmitchellfoundation.org. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  40. ^ "The Efroymson Arts Fellowship - Central Indiana Community Foundation". Central Indiana Community Foundation. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
  41. ^ "3Arts | Amanda Williams". 3arts.org. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
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