American Artist (artist)

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American Artist (born 1989) is a contemporary artist from Altadena, California who works with new media, video, installation, and writing. They legally changed their name in 2013 to reframe the idea of an “American artist” and to embody its meaning. Their work explores blackness, existence, and resistance in a networked world.

In 2022, they presented Shaper of God at REDCAT in Los Angeles. In 2020, the Queens Museum hosted My Blue Window, a multimedia installation plus an app about surveillance and policing. In 2019, I’m Blue (If I Was █████ I Would Die) at Koenig & Clinton turned the gallery into a seminar room for six police cadets to examine Blue Lives Matter alongside issues affecting Black and Brown lives. Earlier, 2016’s Sandy Speaks used a chatbot to imagine Sandra Bland speaking from prison to educate Black youth about police encounters. Their work has been shown at the Queens Museum, the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Koenig & Clinton, HOUSING, and The 8th Floor, and in group shows such as MoMA PS1’s Marking Time (2020), Parallels and Peripheries (MOCA Detroit, 2019), I Was Raised on the Internet (MCA Chicago, 2018), and A Wild Ass Beyond (PSNY, 2018). They were named one of Cultured Magazine’s 30 Young Artists to Watch in 2019. They hold a BFA in Graphic Design from Cal Poly Pomona (2011), an MFA in Fine Arts from Parsons (2015), and completed Whitney’s Independent Study Program in 2017.