Amanda Williams Biography Painting
			ABOUT THE ARTIST... Amanda Williams was raised on the southside of Chicago where she attended the University of Chicago High School. The landscape of Chicago is dominated with much of the history of the Bauhaus - Walter Gropius, Marcel Bauer and Mies van der Rohe. It is no surprise then, that when Williams would attend Cornell University, she would study Architecture with an emphasis on Fine Art. After graduating with honors in 1997, Williams was awarded the Eidlitz Fellowship and traveled to Ethiopia in 2002. She now lives in Oakland, CA, where her vibrant artistic voice is much a force in the community. The influence of Bay Area artists such as Squeak Carwath, Raymond Saunders and Frank Lobdell as teachers of the younger generation of painters has been motivating. In 2004, Williams was invited to show her chef d'oeuvre at the Studio Museum in Harlem's harlemworld: Metropolis as Metaphor, curated by Thelma Golden. Williams has cultivated a particular appreciation for the works of Cy Twombly, Jasper Johns and Helen Frankenthaler. She has inherited in her paintings these aesthetic traditions representing the transcendent spiritual qualities of nature, through a highly developed vocabulary of subtle washes of color. There is no central compositional focus, yet this is itself a principle of the paintings. It requires a way of seeing that defies any analytical approach, with its concentration on individual phenomena, and comes close to the kind of perception that children for a while retain: a continuous shift from space to detail, detail to space. Williams' paintings have their roots in abstract expressionism. If we think for a moment that all western thought is based upon abstraction, from Aristotle, Descartes and Jean-Paul Sartre, 'I think therefore I am,' we search for a truth that stands before us in such a common place, that we are overwhelmed with the reality that confronts us. Nothing is new, except the interpretation of the ordinary because the metamorphosis that takes place before our eyes leads us to a higher perception of our inner voice. Williams' iconography is based upon her autobiographical sensibility. -Winston Branch, Adjunct Professor, U.C. Berkeley

RESUME  Printable Resume   BORN Evanston, IL 1974 EDUCATION 1997 Cornell University, Bachelor of Architecture   1996 University of California, Berkeley, Ford/Mellon Research Fellowship   AWARDS 2004 Hennessy/Schiefflin & Somerset Emerging Artist   2003 Finalist: Competition to Redesign the Highline Rail New York, NY 2001 Robert J. Eidlitz Traveling Fellow Ethiopia 1997 Suzanne Sheng Memorial Thesis Prize for Excellence in Art and Craft Ithica, NY SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2006 I Know A Sparrow Should Sing Guerilla Cafe Berkeley, CA   Back Home Steelelife Gallery Chicago, IL 2005 Days.Paint.Years Joyce Gordon Gallery Oakland, CA 2004 Urban Arts Gala sponsored by Hennessy Cognac and Parks-Hall - The Angel Orensanz Foundation New York, NY   Coloring Soularch Gallery San Francisco , CA 2002 Lyrics on/for Life The Aisha Gallery Oakland, CA   SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2007 Trafficking in Monsters Sara Tecchia Roma Gallery New York, NY Drawn_IN August Wilson Center for African American Culture Pittsburgh, PA 2006 SS10 Recent Work ProArts Gallery Oakland, CA Virology LoBot Gallery Oakland, CA   Seventh Heaven Rush Arts Gallery New York, NY   Swap Meat: Flippin Tha Pimpin SS10 Gallery Oakland, CA   Black Panthers: Rank & File Yerba Buena Center for the Arts San Francisco , CA   Black Creativity The Museum of Science & Industry Chicago, IL   AFROFUTURISM Spaces Gallery Cleveland, OH 2005 AFROFUTURISM The Soap Factory Minneapolis, MN   CCA Faculty Exhibition Oliver Arts Center Oakland, CA   Soul of a Woman South Shore Cultural Center Fine Art Gallery Chicago, IL Trouble Man African American Museum and Library at Oakland Oakland, CA Open Surface The Hollis Street Project Emeryville, CA 2004 AAF Contemporary Art Fair G.R. N'Namdi Gallery New York, NY Art For Life: Benefit Auction Rush Philanthropic Arts Foundation East Hampton , NY harlemworld: Metropolis as Metaphor The Studio Museum in Harlem New York, NY 2003 word: My Definition Is This African American Cultural and Historical Society San Francisco , CA 2002 Free the Spirit Nicole Gallery Chicago, IL Sacred Spaces: In Search of Ethiopia's Living Architecture Wilmer Jennings Gallery New York, NY     COLLECTIONS Hennessy Cognac Cognac, France Cornell University, Africana Studies and Research Center Ithaca, NY     CATALOGS / PUBLICATIONS 2005 Trouble Man : 14 Artists Interpret Marvin Gaye. pub. Soul Salon 10 Collective   2004 harlemworld: Metropolis as Metaphor. pub.Studio Museum in Harlem   1999 Cornell Journal of Architecture No. 6. pub. Cornell University Press       BIBLIOGRAPHY 2005 Wilber, Katie. The Future is Now: Afrofuturists' art comments on technology..., MINNESOTA DAILY, September 29, p. 1A Abbe, Mary. Black to the Future, STAR TRIBUNE September 23, p. E1, E22 Zandars, Rashard. Afrofuturism maps trajectory of race and technology, MINNESOTA SPOKESMAN-RECORDER September 14 Zamora, Jim Herron. Gaye's Influence Transcends Music, SF CHRONICLE April 2, p. B1, B7 Payton, Brenda. Mercy, Mercy: Exhibit Probes Gaye's Pain, OAKLAND TRIBUNE April 8 Downs, David. Mercy Mercy Me:Soul Salon 10 Finds Inspiration..., EASTBAY EXPRESS May 18 2004 Muschamp, Herbert. Metaphors Rise in Harlem Sky, NEW YORK TIMES February 13, p. 31 Rexer, Lyle. Reimagining Harlem, METROPOLIS MAGAZINE May, p. 126-129 Sokol, David. Harlem World, ID MAGAZINE January/February McGee, Celia. Take the A(rt) Train, NEW YORK DAILY NEWS January 30, p. 61 2003 Harms, Bill. Alumna's Harlem Renaissance, LABNOTES Vol. 25, No. 1 p. 12-14 Paul, Pamela. We're Just Friends, Really!, TIME MAGAZINE September 1