1977

Born in Kingston, Jamaica

Lives and works in Brooklyn, NY

2000

Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Somerset County, ME

BFA in Printmaking, The University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA

Selected Solo and Two Person Exhibitions

2023

"And sometimes y," Vielmetter Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA

"AEIOU," Barbara Wien Berlin, Berlin, Germany

2021

"The Story I Tell Myself," Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY

2018

"Speeches Speeches Speeches," Galerie Barbara Wien, Berlin, Germany (Link)

2017

"Dave McKenzie: An Intermission," University Art Museum, University at Albany SUNY, Albany, NY

2016

“Joy Syringe,” Practice Gallery, New York, NY

2015

"Pants full of hope, pockets full of adventure, or... dont call me Cheesuz," Wien Lukatsch, Berlin, Germany

2013

"Where the Good Lord Split You," Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects, Culver City, CA

2012

"Everythings Alright, Nothings Okay!" Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA

2011

"Citizen," Wien Lukatsch Galerie, Berlin, DE

2010

"Dave McKenzie," Aspen Art Museum, Aspen, CO

2009

"On Premises," Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects, Culver City, CA

2008

"Present Tense," Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta, GA

"Screen Doors on Submarines," REDCAT, Los Angeles, CA

2007

"Momentum 8: Dave McKenzie," Institute of Contemporary Art Boston, Boston, MA

"Tomorrow will be Better," Small A Projects, Portland, OR

2006

"Havent Seen You in a Minute," Gallery 400, Chicago, IL

2005

"Portrait as a Ghost," Savage Art Resources, Portland, OR

2004

"Together is Forever", Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects, Culver City, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

"Friends & Lovers," The FLAG Art Foundation, New York, NY

2022

"Whitney Biennial 2022: Quiet as It’s Kept," Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY

2021-2022

"Prospect.5: Yesterday we said tomorrow," The Hancock Whitney Welcome Center, New Orleans, LA

2021

"20 Years," Vielmetter Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA

2020

"20 Years," Vielmetter Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA

2019-2020

"SOFT POWER," SFMOMA, San Francisco, CA

"Colored People Time: Mundane Futures," Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, PA; MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, MA

2018

“Stories of Almost Everyone,” Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA

2017

“Postcards from America,” Celaya Brothers Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico

“The Times,” The FLAG Art Foundation, New York, NY (Link)

“The Half-Life of Love,” MASS MoCA, North Adams, MA (Link)

2016

“Wound: Mending Time and Attention,” Cooper Union, New York, NY

2015

"Morning Pages," Laurel Gitlen, New York, NY

"Glen Ligon: Encounters and Collisions," Nottingham Contemoprary, Nottingham, UK

2014

Whitney Biennial, curated by Stuart Comer, Anthony Elms, and Michelle Grabner, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY

Biel Biennial, Le Mouvement: Performing the City, Movement III: The City Performed, Art Centre Centre PasquArt, Biel Switzerland, curated by Gianni Jetzer

2013

"Radical Presence: Black Performance In Contemporary Art," Contemporary Art Museum, Houston, TX; traveling to Grey Art Gallery at New York University, New York, NY; The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN

Blues for Smoke, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH

"Body Language," The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY

"Assembly Required," Selections from the Permanent Collection, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY

Sinister Pop Family Day, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY

2012

"The Ungovernables," New Museum Triennial, New Museum, New York, NY

"Art Public," Bass Museum of Art, Miami, FL

"The Living Years: Art after 1989," Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN

"Typical Frankenstein," Laurel Gitlen, New York, NY

"Optotype," 92YTribeca, New York, NY

"Year of Cooperation," Broadway 1602, New York, NY

"Configured," Benrimon Contemporary, New York, NY

2011

"The Bearden Project," The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY.

"Drawn to Disaster," ICA, Maine College of Art, Portland, ME.

2010

"The Production of Space," The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY.

"Held Up By Columns," Renwick Gallery, New York, NY.

"At Home/Not At Home: Works From the Collection of Martin and Rebecca Eisenberg, CCS Bard Hessel Museum of Art, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY.

"The Absolutely Other," The Kitchen, New York, NY.

"'Collected.' Reflections on the Permanent Collection," Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY

2009

"30 Seconds off an Inch," Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY

"Unusual Behavior," Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum, Santa Barbara, CA

"Character Generator," Eleven Rivington, New York, NY

"Convention," MOCA, North Miami, FL

"To the left of the rising sun," Small A Projects, New York, NY

"Collected. Propositions on the Permanent Collection," The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY

"Gravity," Cornish Main Gallery, Cornish College of the Arts, Seattle, WA

"Rockstone and Bootheel: Contemporary West Indian Art," Real Art Ways, Hartford, CT

2008

"Prospect.1 New Orleans," International Biennial, curated by Dan Cameron, New Orleans, LA (catalogue)

"This Shadow is a Bit of Ideology," Gallery 400, University of Illinois, Chicago, IL, curated by Kelly Chen and Anthony Elms

"As Others See Us: The Contemporary Portrait," Brattleboro Museum and Art Center, Brattleboro, VT

"Alternating Beats," RISD Museum, Providence, RI

"Museum as Hub: Six Degrees," New Museum, New York, NY (brochure)

"Free Parking," Boston Center for the Arts' Mills Gallery, Boston, MA

"On Procession," Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN

"Black is, Black Aint," The Renaissance Society at the University of Chicago, Chicago, IL (curated by Hamza Walker); traveling to the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, Detroit, MI; H & R Block Artspace, Kansas City, MO

Disinhibition: Black Art and Blue Humor, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, IL

"You & Me," Sometimes, Lehmann Maupin, New York, NY

"Good Doll Bad Doll," Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena, CA

"A New High in Getting Low (NYC)," John Connelly Presents, New York, NY

"2000 Years of Sculpture," Fleisher/Ollman Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

"Working History: African American Art and Objects," Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery, Reed College, Portland, OR (catalog)

"Slightly Unbalanced," Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL; traveling to Huntington Museum of Art, Huntington WV; Paul and Lulu Hilliard University Art Museum, Lafayette, LA; Rodman Hall Arts Center, St. Catharines, Ontario; Museum London, London, Ontario; Joel and Lila Harnett Museum of Art at the University of Richmond Museums, Richmond, VA (catalog)

2007

PERFORMA 07 Biennial: All Together Now, The Studio Museum in Harlem, Harlem, NY (Catalogue)

"Looking Back: The White Columns Annual," selected by Clarissa Dalrymple, White Columns New York, NY

"A New High in Getting Low," Artnews Projects, Berlin, Germany

"Just Kick it Till it Breaks," The Kitchen, New York, NY, curated by Debra Singer and Matthew Lyons, (Catalog)

"Mr. President," University Art Museum, University of Albany, Albany, NY (catalog)

2004

"Me, Myself, and I," Schmidt Center, Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, FL

"Figuratively: Dave McKenzie, Wangechi Mutu, William Villalongo," The Studio Museum, Harlem, NY

"Open House: Working in Brooklyn," Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, NY (catalog)

"The Sneeze 80 x 80", Gazon Rouge Gallery, Athens, Greece

2003

"American Idyll," Metrotech Center Commons, Brooklyn, NY. (Catalog)

"24/7," Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius, Lithuania

"In Practice," Sculpture Center, Long Island City, NY

2002

"Videodrome II," New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, NY

"Americas Remixed," The Factory of the Vapor, Milan, Italy (catalog)

"Queens International," Queens Museum of Art, NY (catalog)

"Listening to New Voices," P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City, NY

"Supervideonight," Gale Gates, New York, NY

"Slow Dive," Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, CA

"Video Marathon: Bringing up the (Mediated) Body," Art in General, New York, NY

"Multiplicity," Midway Gallery, St. Paul, MN

"Room for a Revolution," Deluxe Gallery, Chicago, IL

2001

"Video Call," ICA, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA

"Something/Nothing-Passport to the State of Flux," Art in General, NY

"Material World," Susquehanna Art Museum/VanGo, Harrisburg, PA

"Freestyle," The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY (Catalog) and traveled to Santa Monica Museum of Art, Santa Monica, CA

"In/SITE/Out: Inquiries into Social Space," Apexart, New York, NY

Screening

Ethnography/Biography/Whimsy: Three Contemporary African American, Frederick Douglass Institute for African and African-American Studies, Rochester, NY

Declassified Daytime Screening, New Museum, New York, NY

Declassified: Recent Videos by Erik van Lieshout, Dave McKenzie, Museum, New York, NY

Enactment, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, UK

Videos In Progress: Dave McKenzie, Stairwell Gallery, The RISD Museum, Providence, RI

Videodrome II, New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, NY [Traveled]


Video Cafe: Dave McKenzie, Queens Museum of Art, Queens, NY

Selections from Art in General: A Program of Short Video Works in Russia, Various Venues, Russia.

Supervideonight, Gale Gates, Brooklyn, NY

Fourth Annual Video Marathon: Bringing up the (Mediated) Body, Art in General, New York, NY

Video Call, Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA

Something/Nothing-Passport to the State of Flux, Art in General, New York, NY

Bibliography

2022

Lakin, Max. "Addicted to the Shindig," Artforum, April 2 (Link)

Cotter, Holland. "A Whitney Biennial of Shadow and Light," The NY Times, March 31 (Link)

2021

Klett, Maddie. "Dave McKenzie with Maddie Klett," The Brooklyn Rail, July/August (Link)

Colby Chamberlain. "The Stranger," ArtForum, May (Link)

Kotecha, Shiv. "Dave McKenzie’s Elegiac Reminder of Cultural Debts," Frieze, April 19 (Link)

Lopez Cassell, Dessane. "Dave McKenzie Brings His Methodical Approach to the Whitney Museum’s Façade," Hyperallergic, April 27 (Link)

2020

Durón, Maximiliano. "2020 Prospect New Orleans Triennial to Consider America’s ‘Unprecedented’ Political Moment," ArtNews, March 2 (Link)

Valentine, Victoria L. "Artist List for Prospect New Orleans Triennial Includes Mark Bradford, Willie Birch, Simone Leigh, Dawoud Bey, Glenn Ligon, Karon Davis, Naudline Pierre, and Kevin Beasley," CultureType, March 2 (Link)

"Prospect New Orleans Announces Artist List for Prospect.5," Artforum, March 2 (Link)

2019

Copeland, Huey and Meg Onli. "ABOUT TIME: Huey Copeland in conversation with Meg Onli," Artforum, May (Link)

"ICA Philadelphia Explores Black History in "Colored People Time" Exhibition," Hypebeast, February 15 (Link)

2018

Hanson, Sarah P., "The public joins the protest in Frieze’s Live programme," The Art Newspaper (web), May 4 (Link)

Schneider, Tim, "‘It’s About a Sort of Twisted Magic’: How One Artist Is Revealing the Tricks of Racial Profiling at Frieze New York," Artnet news (web), May 2 (Link)

Greenberger, Alex,"Frieze New York Will Present Adam Pendleton–Designed Black Lives Matter Flag, Hank Willis Thomas Works on Gun Violence," Artnews, April 5 (web) (Link)

Speed, Mitch. "Critics' Picks: Dave McKenzie," Artforum, February (web) (Link)

2017

Yerebakan, Osman Can, “In ‘The Times,’ Artists Make the Media Their Message,” ArtSlant (web), July 21 (Link)

2016

Shaw, Anny, “Performa teams up with the contemporary African art fair in New York,” The Art Newspaper (web), April 12

2015

Pilger, Zoe, Black people in post-war America: New exhibition documents an often brutal experience, The Independent (web), April 7

Petersen, Sarah. "Risk Assessment," X-TRA, Summer

2014

Tuero, Natalia, "Corin Hewitt and Dave McKenzie Among Rome Prize Winners," Art in America online, April 11 (Link)

Schnadt, Sara, "Artists on the Whitney Biennial", KCET Art Bound, May 8 (Link)

Vogel, Shane, Touching Ecstasy, Social Text 121, Winter

2013

Johnson, Ken, "Riffs on Race, Role and Identity," New York Times, September 19

Newton, Mike, "Clashing Visions of Black American Life," The Indypendent, October 30 (Link)

Backer, Yona, "Performance Trace: Staged Actions, Live Art, and Performance Made for the Camera," catalogue for "Radical Presence: Black Performance in Contemporary Art," Contemporary Art Museum Houston

Schwabsky, Barry, Post-White? On Blues for Smoke: The Whiteys adventurous, awkard attempt to explore abstract art through the blues, The Nation, May 20

2012

Schmelzer, Paul, Yesterdays Newspaper: November 8, 2012, Untitled (blog), Walker Art Center, November 8

Simpson, Bennett, Blues for Smoke, exhibition catalogue, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Prestel

Chou, Kimberly, Local Talent Leads Downtown Triennial, Wall Street Journal, February 10

Buchmaier, Barbara, Dave McKenzie, Artforum, January 6

"The Bearden Project", Exhibition Catalogue, The Studio Museum in Harlem

2011

Clifford Owens BOMB, December 15

2009

Haddad, Natalie, Dave McKenzie at Susanne Vielmetter, Frieze, p. 136, November/December

Woodard, Josef, Off the Off Radar Art, Santa Barbara News Press, November 20

Shaw, Michael, Continuing and Recommended, ArtScene, October

Ligon, Glenn, Civic Engagement: To Miss New Orleans, Artforum, January

Born, Katheryn, This Shadow Is A Bit of Ideology, Time Out Chicago, Issue 210, January 1

New York Artists Dictionary Part 1, Flash Art, Volume 62, Number 264, January/February

2008

MacCash, Doug. Prospect.1 New Orleans artist Dave McKenzie practices inspired unproductiveness, The Times-Picayune, November 14

Copeland, Huey, The Blackness of Blackness, ArtForum, October

Foumberg, Jason. Slightly Unbalanced, Frieze, Issue 115, p. 171, May

Weinberg, Lauren, Black Comedy, Time Out Chicago, Issue 164, April

Prospect.1 New Orleans, Exhibition Catalogue, texts by Barbara Bleomink, Dan Cameron, Lolis Eric Elie, and Claire Tancons, Picturebox Inc., Brooklyn, NY, November

McQuaid, Cate, Humor Drives Free Parking exhibit, The Boston Globe, October 15

Just Kick it till it Breaks, Exhibition Catalogue, The Kitchen

Goings on About Town, The New Yorker, May 5

Farrugia, Mallory, Art:Installation, Dave McKenzie, Flavorpill, April

Riggot, Julie, The Season of the Idea, Los Angeles Downtown News, April 28

Mizota, Sharon, Dave McKenzie at REDCAT, Los Angeles Times, April 18

Boucher, Brian, Dave McKenzie, All Together Now, at or near the Studio Museum in Harlem, Art In America, March

Bowie, Chas, Working History: African American Objects, Portland Mercury, February 7

2007

Cotter, Holland, Celebrating the Intangibles Money Cant Buy, The New York Times, December 23

Cotter, Holland, Art is Brief, You Just Have To Be There, The New York Times, November 9

Johnson, Ken, Goldfish, Warhol, and basketball in a video riff on identity politics, Boston Globe, August 10

Malone, Micah, Dave McKenzie Portland, OR Art Papers, May/June

Cotter, Holland, Art In Review, The New York Times, April 13

2006

Moulton, Aaron, 40000, Flash Art, p.72, May/June

2005

Ligon, Glenn, "Black Light", Artforum, pg. 248, September issue

Dirks, Ryan, Dave McKenzie, Portrait as a Ghost, The Portland Mercury, Feb 3

2004

Weinberg, Michelle, Its All About Me, Miami New Times, November 25

Mills, Michael, Through a Fractured Lens, New Times, November 18

Ligon, Glenn, Black Light: David Hammons and the Poetics of Emptiness, Art Forum, 43, no1, pp. 242-249, September

Cotter, Holland, " 'Black' Comes in Many Shadings", New York Times, August 13

Firstenberg, Lauri, "Hit Me, Take Me, Wear Me, Fake me", "Figuratively" at the Studio Museum Harlem, exhibition brochure essay

Laster, Paul, "Back-to-back At SMH - Interviews with Mickalene Thomas and Dave McKenzie", WBURG.com, Vol.4, No.2, Summer

Brockington, Horace, "Extra Open: A conversation with Charlotta Kotik, Dread Scott, Bill Scan", NY Arts Magazine, July-August

2003

Ranger, Abby. Whats Paul Bunyan Doing at Metrotech? Brooklyn Eagle, September 26.

2002

Heuer, Megan. "Queens International." The Brooklyn Rail, Autumn.

Van Dyke, Aaron. Multiplicity. New Art Examiner, May-June.

Knighton, Andrew. An Expanding Pluriverse. Object Magazine.

2001

Princenthal, Nancy. Freestyle. Artext, August-October.

Knight, Christopher, " Cultural Evolution in 'Freestyle' ", Los Angeles Times, October 2.

Valdez, Sarah. Freestyling. Art in America, September.

Cotter, Holland. A Full Studio Museum Show Starts With 28 Young Artists and a Shoehorn., The New York Times, May 11

Saltz, Jerry. POST-BLACK Radical Intelligence at the Studio Museum in Harlem.The Village Voice, May 22

Schjeldahl, Peter. Breaking Away: A flowering of young African-American artists. The New Yorker. June 11

Brockington, Horace. Freestyle: Studio Museum in Harlem. NY Arts Magazine, Vol. 6 No. 6 June

2000

Jones, Karen E., "MoMovements Against the Grain", Freestyle Catalog

Awards, Grants and Fellowships

2018

Artist Grant, Visual Arts, Foundation for Contemporary Arts (Link)

2011

Guna S. Mundheim Visual Arts Fellow, The American Academy in Berlin

2009

USA Rockefeller Fellow, United States Artists

Art Matters Foundation Grant

2008

Rema Hort Mann Foundation Grant

2005

The Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation

William H. Johnson Prize

Michael Richards Fund, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council

2003

Artist-in-Residence, The Studio Museum in Harlem, 2003-2004

2001

Artist-in-Residence, P.S.1 National and International Studio Program, 2001-2002

Group Exhibition Catalogues and Books

2022

Pindell, Howardena. "Howardena Pindell - A New Language," Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh in collaboration with Kettle's Yard, Cambridge and Spike Island, Bristol. pp 67

2012

Simpson, Bennett. Blues for Smoke, exhibition catalogue, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Prestel