photo by Rush Varela Photography
BIO
Ben Kinsley is an interdisciplinary artist working in sound, video, and social/contextual practice. His projects have ranged from choreographing a neighborhood intervention into Google Street View, directing surprise theatrical performances inside the homes of strangers, staging a royal protest, collecting put-down jokes from around the world, and hosting a lecture series in an aspen grove.
He has exhibited internationally at venues such as: Queens Museum, NYC; Cleveland Museum of Art; Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) Cleveland; Bureau for Open Culture; Mattress Factory Museum, Pittsburgh; Flux Space, Philadelphia; Katonah Museum of Art, NY; Green on Red Gallery, Dublin; Centro di Cultura Contemporanea Strozzina, Florence; La GalerĂa de Comercio, Mexico City; Catalyst Arts, Belfast; and ZKM Museum of Contemporary Art, Karlsruhe.
He has been an artist-in-residence at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture; Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts; Skaftfell Art Center, Iceland; Askeaton Contemporary Arts, Ireland; and Platform, Finland. His work has been featured on NPR, Associated Press, The Washington Post, Artforum.com, Wired.com, Rhizome.org, and Hyperallergic, among others.
Kinsley is an Associate Professor and Co-Director of Visual Art in the Department of Visual & Performing Arts at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs and Co-Founder of The Yard.
Ben is also an avid mushroom hunter and amateur mycologist. He is a past president and current board member of the Pikes Peak Mycological Society and has led forays with PPMS, the North American Mycological Association (NAMA), and the Telluride Mushroom Festival. Kinsley and his artist team are four-time winners in the Telluride Mushroom Festival costume contest, and images of their mushroom costumes have been featured in Vogue, Travel + Leisure, and Mushroom People Magazine.
CV
Short Summary CV (PDF)
SELECTED INTERVIEWS / LECTURES / WRITING
-
- “1,000 Miles Per Hour” catalog Interview with Darren Lee Miller
- Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center “In Studio” Interview
- PBS Arts District Feature
- Westword Colorado Creatives Feature
- NPR Weekend Edition Interview
- Surprisingly Awesome Podcast
- Yale University Radio Interview
- 2015 Summer Institute for Visual Arts Lecture
- MOCA Cleveland ArtCast Interview: Part 1 | Part 2
- The Making of “Street With A View” from Mattress Factory Museum
- Zen of the Woods: a Foray into Art and Mushrooming on Temporary Art Review
PROJECT SITES / BLOGS / ETC
-
- Tree Talks: soundcloud.com/tree-talks
- The Yard: whatsintheyard.com
- Janks Archive: janksarchive.org
- Don’t Spit Can’t Swim Podcast: soundcloud.com/dontspit
- Janks Research Blog: janksarchive.tumblr.com
- iNaturalist Profile: inaturalist.org/people/benkinsley
CONTACT
benkinsley(at)gmail(dot)com