Faythe Levine

Faythe Levine has been in service to the arts for over twenty years, advocating for creativity to be used as a vehicle to build community, personal independence, and empowerment. Motivated by reimagining archives and collections through a queer feminist lens, her creative labor intersects with curatorial projects, consulting, writing, documentary film, and community events. Her core belief is that visual culture is a conduit for radical change and generative dialog. She strives to perpetuate momentum toward a liberatory future with space for collaboration, transparency, and complexity.

Levine recently published her fourth book, As Ever, Miriam (2024), which explores the expansive lives of Charlotte Partridge (1882–1975) and Miriam Frink (1892–1978) through deep archival research over the course of six years. A related exhibition focusing on their domestic space in Milwaukee will open at the Lynden Sculpture Garden in November 2025.

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During the week, Levine is the Hauser & Wirth Institute Archivist for Women's Studio Workshop, a feminist organization founded in 1974 in Rosendale, NY, where she manages, oversees, and increases public visibility of the archives, special collections, and exhibitions management. Her position focuses on WSW’s work as a hub for radical thought, for modeling economic viability for print and book culture and story-telling, and for technical exploration in multiple mediums.

In 2021, Levine left her position at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center as director of the Arts/Industry program, where she was responsible for the development and administration of the residency hosted at Kohler Co. and curating related exhibitions and projects at the Arts Center and Art Preserve in Sheboygan, WI.

Significant curatorial work includes Can't Take My Eyes Off You; Speedwell Contemporary, 2022; Ruffles, Repair & Ritual; at the Wedding Cake House with the support of the Warhol Foundation, 2019; and For Hire: Contemporary Sign Painting in America, Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, 2017. Further back, Levine was the gallerist of two non-traditional spaces, Sky High (2010–2014) and Paper Boat (2005–2009), that focused on collaborations with emerging artists and makers. Additionally, she founded and operated Wisconsin’s premier maker fair, Art vs. Craft (2005–2015). 

Her most well-known projects are Sign Painters (2013) and Handmade Nation: The Rise of DIY Art, Craft, and Design (2009). Both are featured-length documentaries with accompanying books published by Princeton Architectural Press and were toured extensively. Some highlights include programming the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Institution, Dundee Contemporary Arts, Brooklyn Museum, Museum of Arts and Design, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and the Victoria and Albert Museum. Bar Dykes (2015), published by Pegacorn Press, can be found in the Whitney Museum of American Art Special Collections, Joseph C. Sloane Art Library of the UNC-Chapel Hill’s University Libraries, Colby College Libraries, and the Pratt Institute Library. 

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After years of bouncing between various cities and towns in the United States, Levine landed in New York State. She lives with her partner and their cat, Goldie, on a dead-end street with no home mail delivery or garbage service next to a beautiful cemetery and creek on the stolen Indigenous land of the Mochican and Schaghticoke peoples in a hamlet called Mellenville.​

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Last updated: February 2025. Please ask permission before using site content or images.

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