Amanda McDonald Crowley

Independent cultural worker, curator: Public Art Action.

I create new media and contemporary art exhibitions and events. I am currently working on artist Mary Mattingly’s Swale, a floating food forest on NYC waterways, and has been commissioned to develop an exhibition for the Bronx Arts Alliance in 2018.

I have recently developed exhibitions and public art programs with Kulturföreningen Triennal (southern Sweden), PointB (Brooklyn), New Media Scotland and the Edinburgh Science Festival (Edinburgh), the Austrian Cultural Forum (New York City), Pixelache and the Finnish Bioart Society (Helsinki), Gallery CalIT2 at the University of California, San Diego (San Diego), and Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts (Omaha).

I have held executive leadership positions with Eyebeam art + technology center in New York, Australian Network for Art and Technology, and the Australia Council for the Arts. I have also worked on several significant international Festivals – for which I curated and produced programs of internationally significant artist residencies, symposia, and exhibitions – including ISEA2004 (International Symposium of Electronic Art) in Helsinki, Finland, Adelaide Festival 2002, and the Australian Video Festival. I've had articles published in journals such as Voices in Contemporary Art (VoCA), ArtLink, and Art Asia Pacific; and I've done curatorial residencies at Helsinki International Artists Program (Finland), Santa Fe Art Institute (USA), Bogliasco Foundation (Italy), Sarai New Media Institute (India), and Banff Center for the Arts (Canada).

My work has largely been at the intersection of art + technology, and her experience and interests often revolve around working with artists and groups who have a research based practice. In my curatorial work, I am especially interested in developing platforms to generate dialogue, bringing together professionals and amateurs from varied disciplines, and creating space for social change and audience engagement.

Most recently, a key curatorial research focus has been around the topic of food + art. Projects include Agrikultura, a major public art event in Malmö, Sweden in 2017; the exhibition food nostalgia, at Radiator Gallery in Long Island City, NYC, 2016; Circuit of the Senses, a celebratory meal and participatory event conceived by artist Emilie Baltz at Bemis Center in Omaha, Nebraska in 2014; GastroLabs, a program series developed with New Media Scotland for the Edinburgh Science Festival 2014.