Rashaad Newsome’s work blends several practices, including collage, sculpture, film & video, animation, photography, music, writing, computer programming, software engineering, community organizing, and performance, to create a divergent field that mirrors the intersectionality of their lived experience. Using the diasporic traditions of improvisation, they pull from the world of advertising, the internet, art history, Black and Queer culture to produce counter-hegemonic work that shifts between social practice and abstraction. Collage acts as a conceptual and technical method to construct a new visual, performance, sonic, machine learning, and literary language that highlights the immaterial and material expressivity related to Black American life. Newsome holds a 2023 Doctoral degree in Fine Arts from the University of Connecticut and a 2001 BFA in Art History from Tulane University. In 2005 studied MAX/MSP Programming at Harvestworks Digital Media Art Center and holds a 2002 certificate of study in Digital Post Production from Film/Video Arts Inc.
Rashaad has exhibited and performed in galleries, museums, institutions, and festivals throughout the world, including The Studio Museum in Harlem (NYC), The National Museum of African American History and Culture (DC), The Park Avenue Armory Drill Hall (NYC), The Whitney Museum (NYC), Brooklyn Museum (NYC), MoMAPS1 (NYC), Museum of the African Diaspora (SF, CA), SFMOMA (CA), New Orleans Museum of Art (LA), Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), Hayward Gallery (London), CA2M Centro de Arte dos de Mayo (Spain), The Garage Center for Contemporary Culture (Moscow), and MUSA (Vienna).
Newsome’s work is in numerous public and private collections, including the Studio Museum in Harlem (NYC), the Whitney Museum of American Art (NYC), The Brooklyn Museum of Art (NYC), The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (CA), The de Young Museum (CA), The Oakland Museum of California (CA), Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LA), McNay Art Museum (TX), Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VA), SCAD Museum of Art (GA), The Chazen Museum of Art (WI), National Museum of African American History and Culture (DC) and The New Britain Museum of American Art (CT), and The Saastamoinen Foundation of Finland. In 2010, he participated in the Whitney Biennial (NYC), and in 2011 Greater New York at MoMAPS1 (NYC).
Rashaad’s many honors and awards for his work include a 2023 Honorary Degree of Doctor of Fine Arts from the University of Connecticut; 2023 ITVS Documentary Film Funding; SF Dance Film Festival Award; 2022 Prix Ars Electronica Golden Nica Award For Computer Animation; The 2022 NEWFEST Emerging Black LGBTQ+ Filmmaker Award; 2022 Bessie Award for Outstanding Choreographer/Creator and Outstanding Visual Design; 2022 Berkeley FILM Foundation grant; 2021/2022, 18th Street Art Center artist Residency; 2021, Knight Arts + Tech Fellowship; 2020/2022, Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence artist residency; 2020 Eyebeam Rapid Response Fellowship; 2019, LACMA Art + Technology Lab Grant; 2019, BAVC MediaMaker Fellowship; 2018/2019 New York Live Arts Live Feed Creative Residency; 2018, William Penn Foundation Grant; 2017, The Pollock-Krasner Foundation Inc. Grant; 2017, Artist & Editions Award, Baltimore Museum of Art; 2016, Artist-in-Residence, Tamarind Institute; 2014, Artist-in-Residence, Headlands Center for the Arts; 2012, Artist-in-Residence, McColl Center for Visual Art; 2011, Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award; 2011, Artist-in-Residence, Pilchuck Glass School; 2010, The Urban Artist Initiative Artist Grant; 2009, Rema Hort Mann Foundation Visual Arts Grant; 2009, Harvestworks Van Lier Grant; 2009, Summer/Fall Artist in Residence Program, Eyebeam; 2008, International Residency Program, Location 1; 2008, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s Workspace Artist Residency; 2006, Franklin Furnace Grant for Performance Art; 2005, Artist in Residence, Harvestworks; 2005, Artist in Residence, L’Entreprise Culturelle.