Heather Renée Russ
Heather Renée Russ (she/they) works across photography, installation and bio-art. They blend organic marine materials with queer femme signifiers, like wig hair and false eyelashes. Their work engages with themes of displacement while celebrating the vibrant communities queers have historically created in cities by the sea. They utilize photography to create detailed imagery incorporating glitch. They also build live algae bioreactors in femme signifying vessels that take in carbon and produce oxygen. Russ’s work is influenced by queer ecology and speaks to the fragmentation many queers feel as spaces of gathering, including queer beaches, are under threat from climate change and gentrification.
Russ showed with Paradice Palace at NADA Miami during 2023 Miami Art Week. They participated in SPRING/BREAK Art Show in NYC during 2023 Armory Week as both an artist and a curator. Russ also exhibited at SomoS in Berlin, IMT Gallery in London and Satellite Art Fair in Miami. In 2024 Russ showed two installations with NYC-based apexart. In New York, Russ has also shown at Flux Factory, ChaShaMa and Ethan Cohen’s Kube. They have completed residencies at Vermont Studio Center, ChaShaMa North, TransBorder Art and twice at MASS MoCA. Russ has upcoming residencies at NARS and LMCC in NYC. Russ draws from a rich history of stewarding queer underground art spaces. They co-produced Club Feral, a raucous mutual-aid focused queer nightclub in San Francisco and the collaborative queer art space in Brooklyn known as Lair Fera.
PP SHOWS [CURRENT + PAST]
AVAILABLE WORK