Legacy Russell

Russell was born in New York City and grew up in the East Village. She is the daughter of Harlem-born photographer and technologist Ernest Russell and Kamala Mottl, a community gerontologist. She is the great-granddaughter of Nolle Smith, Black cowboy, engineer, and Hawaii statesman.{{Cite book|last=Gugliotta|first=Bobette|date=1971|title=Nolle Smith: Cowboy, Engineer, Statesman|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5mzxAAAAMAAJ|archive-url=|archive-date=|access-date=|publisher=Dodd, Mead |isbn=9780396063902 }} She attended Friends Seminary, a Quaker school in Manhattan.{{Cite web|date=2019-01-25|title=Legacy Russell on Glitch Feminism, Curating and the Upside of Growing Up in New York|url=https://www.culturedmag.com/legacy-russell-studio-museum/|access-date=2020-06-17|website=Cultured Magazine|language=en-US}} Russell holds a dual-major BA from Macalester College in Studio Art and Art History and English & Creative Writing, as well as an MRes in Art History and Visual Culture with distinction from Goldsmiths, University of London. Her graduate dissertation focused on the notion of "re-performing reality" and shared research on artists such as Devin Kenny, Ann Hirsch, Awol Erizku.{{Cite web|date=|title=Prayer? Or Practice? Social Shrines and the Ritualized Performance of Reality in Contemporary Art|url=https://www.academia.edu/31094638|archive-url=|archive-date=|access-date=|website=Academia.edu|last1=Russell|first1=Legacy}}

Russell worked at the online platform Artsy, expanding the company's gallery relations across Europe. She has worked at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Whitney Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum, and CREATIVE TIME.{{Cite web |last=Valentine |first=Victoria L. |date=2021-06-25 |title=Legacy Russell Appointed Executive Director and Chief Curator at The Kitchen, an Experimental Interdisciplinary Art Space in New York |url=https://www.culturetype.com/2021/06/25/legacy-russell-appointed-executive-director-and-chief-curator-at-the-kitchen-an-experimental-interdiscipinary-art-space-in-new-york/ |access-date=2025-02-05 |website=Culture Type |language=en-US}} She is a contributing editor at BOMB Magazine.{{Cite web|last=Armstrong|first=Annie|date=2018-08-09|title=Studio Museum in Harlem Names Legacy Russell Associate Curator|url=https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/studio-museum-harlem-names-legacy-russell-associate-curator-10791/|access-date=2020-06-17|website=ARTnews.com|language=en-US}}

Russell writes about art, gender, race, and technology, particularly as they intersect with histories of cyberculture. In 2012, Russell coined the term "Glitch Feminism",{{cite web |last1=Davis |first1=Ben |title='I Say Tear It All Down': Curator Legacy Russell on How 'Glitch Feminism' Can Be a Tool to Radically Reimagine the World |url=https://news.artnet.com/art-world/legacy-russell-glitch-feminism-a-manifesto-1910221 |website=Artnet |access-date=22 August 2021 |date=28 September 2020}} which Russell says "embod[ies] error as a disruption to gender binary, as a resistance to the normative".{{Cite web|last=Lavender|first=Pandora|title=7 Questions: Legacy Russell|url=https://frieze.com/article/7-questions-legacy-russell|access-date=2020-06-18|website=Frieze|date=15 April 2019 |language=en}}

In 2019, The Carl & Marilynn Thoma Art Foundation awarded Russell the Arts Writing Award in Digital Arts, which offers awardees a spot in the Rauschenberg Residency fellowship.{{Cite web|title=Legacy Russell wins 2019 Arts Writing Award in Digital Arts|url=https://www.contemporaryand.com/magazines/legacy-russell-wins-2019-arts-writing-award-in-digital-arts/|access-date=2020-06-17|website=Contemporary And|language=de}}

Her first book, Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto, was published in September 2020 by Verso Books. A Forbes review stated, "Glitch Feminism is a rallying cry, a recapturing of cyberfeminism oriented to include and spotlight the many queer and non-white voices who in their practice live out the awesome potential of an enmeshed digital feminism: the glitch."{{Cite web|last=Damiani|first=Jesse|title=On Embodying The Ecstatic And Catastrophic Error Of Glitch Feminism: Book Review|url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/jessedamiani/2020/10/15/on-embodying-the-ecstatic-and-catastrophic-error-of-glitch-feminism-book-review/|access-date=2021-01-11|website=Forbes|language=en}} The New York Times stated the book is "Grounded in theory... but a fast, percussive read".{{cite news |last1=Smith |first1=Roberta |last2=Cotter |first2=Holland |last3=Farago |first3=Jason |last4=Mitter |first4=Siddhartha |title=Best Art Books of 2020 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/26/arts/design/best-art-books-2020.html |access-date=1 August 2021 |work=The New York Times |date=26 November 2020}}

In May 2024, Russell published her second book, Black Meme: A History of the Images that Make Us, with Verso Books.{{Cite book |last=Russell |first=Legacy |url=https://books.google.com/books/about/Black_Meme.html?id=CWr7EAAAQBAJ&source=kp_book_description |title=Black Meme: A History of the Images that Make Us |date=2024-05-07 |publisher=Verso Books |isbn=978-1-83976-282-6 |language=en}} According to Russell's website, Black Meme, "explores the impact of Blackness, Black life, and Black social death on contemporary conceptions of virality borne in the age of the Internet."{{cite web |title=Black Meme |url=https://www.legacyrussell.com/BLACK-MEME |website=legacyrussell.com |access-date=1 August 2021 |language=en}} Black Meme was awarded a Creative Capital Award in 2021.{{Cite web|title=Black Meme|url=https://creative-capital.org/projects/black-meme/|access-date=2021-01-10|website=Creative Capital|language=en}}

Russell's curatorial and academic work focuses on queer histories, blackness in visual culture, Internet culture, feminism, and new media. As a curator she has done work around her originating concept of Glitch Feminism. Russell has curated exhibitions and projects at the Museum of Modern Art,{{Cite web|date=2019-11-02|title=Answering the Colonizers of Modernism|url=https://hyperallergic.com/526153/projects-110-michael-armitage-at-the-museum-of-modern-art/|access-date=2020-06-17|website=Hyperallergic|language=en-US}} MoMA PS1,{{Cite web|date=2019-12-10|title=Best of 2019: Our Top NYC Art Shows|url=https://hyperallergic.com/532296/best-of-2019-our-top-nyc-art-shows-and-more/|access-date=2020-06-17|website=Hyperallergic|language=en-US}} Institute of Contemporary Art, London,{{Cite web|title=Next: 28 Art Curators to Watch Who Took on New Appointments in 2018|date=30 December 2018 |url=https://www.culturetype.com/2018/12/29/next-28-art-curators-to-watch-who-took-on-new-appointments-in-2018/|access-date=2020-06-17|language=en-US}} Performa's Radical Broadcast,{{Cite web|title=PERFORMA|url=https://performa-arts.org/lean-curated-by-legacy-russell-associate-curator|access-date=2021-06-06|website=performa-arts.org}} Kunsthall Stavanger{{Cite web |title=LEAN |url=https://kunsthallstavanger.no/en/exhibitions/lean-curated-by-legacy-russell |access-date=2025-02-05 |website=Kunsthall Stavanger |language=en}} in Norway, and The Studio Museum in Harlem.{{Cite news|last=Mitter|first=Siddhartha|date=2019-07-10|title=Studio Museum in Harlem Names Artists in Residence|language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/10/arts/design/studio-museum-harlem-artists-in-residence.html|access-date=2020-06-17|issn=0362-4331}}

Russell was associate curator of exhibitions at the Studio Museum in Harlem from 2018 to 2021.{{Cite web|last=Editorial|first=Artsy|date=2020-02-20|title=4 Curators on the Artists They're Celebrating This Black History Month|url=https://www.artsy.net/article/casey-lesser-4-curators-artists-celebrating-black-history-month|access-date=2020-06-17|website=Artsy|language=en}}{{Cite web|title=Artforum.com|url=https://www.artforum.com/news/studio-museum-in-harlem-names-legacy-russell-associate-curator-exhibitions-76161|access-date=2020-06-17|website=www.artforum.com|date=9 August 2018 |language=en-US}} In 2021, The Kitchen announced that Russell would succeed Tim Griffin as the institution's next executive director and chief curator; she is the first Black person to hold the position of executive director and chief curator at The Kitchen since its founding in 1971.

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