Re'al Christian is a writer, critic, editor, and art historian based in New York. Her work explores material histories of diasporas, movement, language, and ecology. Her criticism, essays, and interviews have appeared in BOMB Magazine, Art in America, Artforum, The Brooklyn Rail, and ART PAPERS, where she is a Contributing Editor. She has written texts for books and catalogues including Prospect.6: The Future Is Present, The Harbinger Is Home (Monacelli Press / Prospect New Orleans), And ever an edge (Studio Museum in Harlem), Track Changes: A Handbook for Art Criticism (Paper Monument), Howardena Pindell: Numbers/Pathways/Grids (Garth Greenan / Dieu Donné), and On the Town: A Performa Compendium, 2016–2021 (Gregory R. Miller & Co.), among others.

Her editorial projects include the digital publishing series Post/doc (2022–present), Maria Hupfield’s Breaking Protocol (2023), and An Incomplete* Listing of NYC Libraries, Reading Rooms, and Archives, now in its second edition. She is the co-editor of the anthologies As for Protocols (2025) and Acts of Art in Greenwich Village (2025). She guest co-edited the fall 2025 issue of ART PAPERS, Horror After Horror, and is a consulting editor for the forthcoming 50 Years of ART PAPERS (2026). Her curatorial projects include Repetition means a/void at Parent Company (2023); Steven Anthony Johnson II: Getting Blood from Stone at the International Studio & Curatorial Program (2022); and The earth leaked red ochre (2022) at Miriam Gallery. She also worked on the exhibitions The Black Index (2020–22) and Life as Activity: David Lamelas (2021) at the Hunter College Art Galleries.

Christian is currently the Assistant Director of Editorial Initiatives at the Vera List Center for Art and Politics at The New School. She received her MA in Art History from Hunter College, and she holds a bachelor’s degree from New York University, where she double majored in Art History and Media, Culture, and Communication.

Photo by Luis Corzo