KIYAN WILLIAMS
Lives and works in Brookyln, NY
EDUCATION
2019 MFA in Visual Arts, Columbia University, New York, NY
2013 BA with Honors in Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity Studies, Stanford University, Stanford, CA
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2023
Between Starshine and Clay, Peres Projects, Seoul, South Korea
A Past That Is Future Tense, Peres Projects, Milan, Italy
A Crack Beneath the Weight of It All, Altman-Seigel, San Francisco, CA
2022
Between Starshine and Clay: Hammer Projects: Kiyan Williams curated by Erin Christovale, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, California
Un/earthing, Lyles and King, New York, NY
2021
Reaching Towards Warmer Suns, Anderson Collection, Stanford University
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2022
Symbionts: Contemporary Artists and the Biosphere curated by Caroline A. Jones, Natalie Bell, and Selby Nimrod, MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, MA
Indisposable: Tactics for Care and Mourning curated by Jessica A. Cooley and Ann M. Fox, Ford Foundation Gallery, NY, NY
Black Atlantic curated by Daniel S. Palmer and Hugh Hayden, Public Art Fund, Brooklyn, NY
Put It This Way: (Re)Visions of the Hirshhorn Collection curated by Anne Reeve, Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, DC
52 Artists: A Feminist Milestone curated by Amy Smith-Stewart, The Alderich Museum Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield, CT
2021
Bodies in Conflict, Visual Arts Center of Clarington, Bowanville, Ontario, Canada
How to Cook a Wolf curated by Alison Karasyk, Center for Book Arts, New York, NY
Unfinished Live, Haus der Elektronischen Künste (Basel) and The Shed (NYC)
Reaching Towards Warmer Suns, The Anderson Collection, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA
The Skin I’m In, Lyles and King, New York, NY
Land Akin, Smack Mellon, New York, NY
Dissolution, Leslie Lohman Museum, New York, NY
Between Starshine and Clay, The Art Gallery at Westchester Community College, Westchester, NY
Indisposable Bodies, Ford Foundation Gallery, New York, NY
2020
Listening to the Unsaid, David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
In the Beginning: Media Art and History from the Hirshhorn’s Collection, Hirshhorn Museum, Washington D.C.
For Which It Stands, Ford Foundation Gallery, New York, NY
something else (Variations on Americana). Recess Art, New York, NY
Call and Response: Making Monuments Now. Socrates Sculpture Park, New York, NY
Up Close. The Shed, New York, NY
2019
Open Call. The Shed, New York, NY
Nobody Promised You Tomorrow: Art 50 Years After Stonewall. The Brooklyn Museum, New York, NY Columbia
MFA Thesis Exhibition curated by Regine Basha. Wallach Art Gallery, New York, NY
In Practice: Other Objects curated by Gee Wesley. SculptureCenter, New York, New York
2018
The Least Orthodox Goddess curated by Jasmine Wahi. Jenkins Johnson Gallery, New York, NY
feel that other day running underneath this one curated by Sarah O'Keefe. Times Square Space, New York, NY
Pride & Loss curated by Zanele Muholi. Jenkins Johnson Gallery, New York, NY
Columbia MFA First Year Exhibition curated by Natalie Ball. Wallach Art Gallery, New York, NY
RESIDENCIES AND AWARDS
2023
Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship
2022
Smack Mellon Residency, Brooklyn, NY
2021
Franklin Furnace Fund, Brooklyn, NY
BOFFO Residency, Fire Island, NY
Graham Foundation Grant, Chicago, NY
2020
Socrates Annual Fellowship, Socrates Sculpture Park, Queens, NY
Recess Art Fellowship, Brooklyn, NY
2019
The Fountainhead Fellowship, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA
2018
Queer Artist Fellowship, Leslie Lohman Gallery, New York, NY
Museum Education Practicum, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY
2017
Visual Arts Scholarship, Columbia University School of The Arts, New York, NY
WORK EXPERIENCE
2022 - 2023
Part-Time Faculty, MFA Program at Parsons School of Design, The New School, New York, NY
2019 - 2020
Fountainhead Fellow and Visiting Professor, Virginia Commonwealth University, Department of Sculpture and Extended Media, School of the Arts, Richmond, VA
2018
Faculty, Sadie Nash Leadership Project, Rutgers University-Newark, Newark, NJ
2018 - 2019
Teaching Assistant for Performance Art Course with Kembra Pfahler and Liz Magic-Lazer, Columbia University, New York, NY
ARTIST TALKS AND LECTURES
2023
Visiting Artist Lecture, Columbia University, NY, NY (forthcoming)
2022
Visiting Artist Lecture, SUNY Purchase, New York, NY
Artist Talk With Pamela Sneed, Water at the Edge Symposium, Park Avenue Armory, New York, NY
Boundless Black Futures Symposium, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA
Artist Talk, Dia Art Foundation, Beacon, NY
Captcha: Dancing, Data, and Liberation: Rashaad Newsome, Kiyan Williams, Saidiya Hartman, Aimee Meredith Cox, Arthur Jafa, and Tavia Nyong'o in Conversation, Park Avenue Armory, New York, NY
Artist Lecture, Anderson Collection, Stanford, CA
2021
What the soil remembers: Kiyan Williams and Kathryn Yusoff, NYU GSAS Music Colloquium Series, New York University, New York, NY
Beyond Representation: Black Queer Disruptions in Fine Art, Queer.Art.Matters: A Symposium, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA
Creative Cookbook: Kiyan Williams and Rashaad Newsome in Conversation, Leslie Lohman Museum
2020
Art and Soil: Artist Talk with Kiyan Williams, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.
Art In Our Moment: Kiyan Williams and Gioncarlo Valentine in Conversation, Columbia University, New York, NY
2019
Artist Lecture, Virginia Commonwealth University, New York, NY
Summer of Know: Kiyan Williams and Ericka Hart in Conversation, Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY
In Conversation: Kiyan Williams with Darnell Moore, Presented by The Studio Museum in Harlem and New York Public Library Trans Oral History Project, Gavin Brown’s Enterprises, New York, NY
Artist Talk, Bedford Library - Brooklyn Public Library, Brooklyn, New York
Panelist, Creative Black Futures, Interplanetary Festival, Santa Fe Institute, Santa Fe, NM
Visiting Artist Lecture, Portland State University, Portland, OR
Artist Talk, Pratt Institute, New York, NY
Queer Art/Queer Theory: In Conversation with Dr. Tavia Nyong’o, Queer Disruptions 3, Conference, Columbia University, New York, New York
Race, Sex & Cinema: The World of Marlon Riggs, Brooklyn, New York
2018
Artist Talk and Workshop, Grounding, Stanford University, Stanford, CA
Artist Lecture, Reflections: Performing Black and Queer Archives, Allied Media Conference, Detroit, MI
2017
Marlon Riggs & “No Regret”: Disclosure, Performativity, & Legacy: Kiyan Williams, Ni’Ja Whitson and Tavia Nyong’o In Conversation, The 8th Floor, New York, York
Guest Lecturer, Black Studies and the Black Radical Tradition Reading Group, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
Guest Lecturer, Intersectional Feminism and Performance Course, School of Visual Arts, New York, NY
CURATORIAL AND PUBLIC PROGRAMMING WORK
2019
Curator, Trans/gression: An Evening of Performance Celebrating the 25th Anniversary of GLQ, Queer Disruptions, Conference (QD3), Columbia University, New York, NY
2017
Organizer and moderator, Revolution ‘67 Film Screening and Discussion, Gallery Aferro, Newark, NJ
BIBLIOGRAPHY AND PRESS
2022
The Moon Is Trans: On Cultivating An Aesthetics of Reaching / Jeanne Vaccaro in conversation with P. Staff and Kiyan Williams, Texte Zur Kunst, March 2023
Trans Abstractions, Decomposing Figurations: Young Joon Kwak and Kiyan Williams, Texte Zur Kunst, March 2023
Kiyan Williams: Unsettling The Histories of Public Sculpture, Monuments Lab Bulletin, Sept 2022
Young Artists 2023 Feature, Cultured Magazine, November 29, 2022
Symbionts: Contemporary Artists and the Biosphere Exhibition Catalog, MIT Press, October 2022
Kiyan Williams: Unsettling the Histories of Public Sculpture, Marica Antonucci, Monuments Lab, September 2022
Wendy Vogel on Kiyan Williams, Art Forum, September 2022
The Modern Art Notes Podcast, Tyler Green, July 2022
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden: The Collection edited by Stéphane Aquin and Anne Reeve with Sandy Guttman, July 2022
Why This Artist Is Deep-Frying American Flags—and Inviting Guests to Bring Their Favorite Seasonings for the Batter, Artnet News, Taylor Defoe, June 2022
Pick of the Week: Kiyan Williams Hammer Museum, Artillery Magazine, June 2022
Monuments Now Exhibition Catalog, Socrates Sculpture Park, 2022
2021
Forms That Don’t Exist Yet, Louis Bury, BOMB Magazine, November 2021
Nobody Promised You Tomorrow: Art 50 Years After Stonewall: Exhibition Catalog, Brooklyn Museum, 2021
Future/Present:, Culture in a Changing America, Duke University Press, Forthcoming 2021 Sophia MA, Land Akin At Smack Mellon, Whitehot Magazine, Feb 2021
Trans in a Time of HIV/AIDS, Transgender Studies Quarterly, Duke University Press, November, 2020 2020
Kiyan Williams Digs Into the Meaning of Soil, Louis Bury, Hyperallergic, Nov 2020 2019
The Archive Issue Number 67, Leslie Lohman Museum, October 2019
Alumni Artists Featured at the Shed in Hudson Yards, Rebecca Shapiro, Columbia Magazine, July 2019 Zoë Lescaze, 13 Artists Reflect on the Stonewall Riots, New York Times Magazine, June 2019
Some of the People New Magic, Gene Denby, Code Switch, NPR, June 2019
Rebecca Carroll, Commemorating Stonewall Through the Art of Queer Millennials, WNYC, June 2019 Zachary Small, Artist Profile, Hyperallergic, June 2019
In Practice: Other Objects Exhibition Catalog, SculptureCenter, March 2019
2016
Magnus Rosengarten, “It Is Necessary To Be Able To Dream,” Contemporary& Magazine, Oct 2016
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
The Hammer Museum
Grinnell College Museum of Art
Baltimore Museum of Art
Pitzer College