Rachel Sussman

About Rachel Sussman

Rachel Sussman is a contemporary artist based in Brooklyn. Through her work she aims to connect personal time to cosmic time as a means to activate long term thinking. She spent a decade developing the critically acclaimed project The Oldest Living Things in the World, for which she researched, worked with biologists, and traveled​ all over the world to photograph continuously living organisms years old and older​. The project is now a ​New York Times bestselling book and traveling exhibition​. ​​Her current studio work involves grappling with the space between ephemerality and eternity.(Selected) History of the Spacetime Continuum, a site-specific handwritten timeline of the universe ​at​ MASS MoCA, begins before the Big Bang, and extends 10 to the 100 billion years into the future. The piece employs handwriting—and is peppered with humor, not to mention glitter—to highlight the individual, human attempt to make sense of our time and place in the universe. Other new works include a Tibetan sand mandala of the Cosmic Microwave Background, sometimes known as the \"baby picture of the universe,\" as well as Sidewalk Kintsukuroi, or \"golden repair,\" borrowing from the Japanese aesthetic philosophy rendering something more beautiful for having been broken. ​In addition to her artwork, Sussman worked as an Interactive Producer for over 10 years and managed large teams and interdisciplinary projects ranging from NBC.com’s Homicide and Saturday Night Live websites to educational software projects employing speech recognition technologies. She also performed trapeze as part of the duo The Amazing Siblings throughout New York, though her acrobatic career was cut short by a rotator cuff injury.

Experience

1. Ted Resident

   TED Conferences

   Sep 2016 — Present

   The TED Residency program is an in-house incubator for breakthrough ideas. Residents spend four months in the TED office with fellow brilliant minds who are creatively taking on projects that are making significant changes in their communities, across many different fields.

Education

• Bard College

  MFA, Fine Art Photography

  2008 — 2008

• School of Visual Arts

  BFA, Photography

  1995 — 1998

• University of the Arts London

  PhD, Practice-based fine arts

  2008 — 2009

Skills

• Art Direction
• Fine Art Photography
• Adobe Creative Suite
• Digital Media
• Editing
• Interaction Design
• Graphic Design
• Environmental Awareness
• Drawing
• Photography
• Art
• Digital Photography
• Strategy
• Environmental Issues
• Environmental Science
• Illustration
• Public Speaking
• Contemporary Art
• Information Architecture
• New Media
• Content Management
• Art Education
• Creative Direction
• Fine Art
• Painting
• Curating
• Advertising
• Copywriting
• Museums
• Editorial