Mimi Onuoha

Ọnụọha was born in 1989 in Parma, Italy,^[4] and grew up in Houston, Texas.^[5] Ọnụọha majored in anthropology^[6] at Princeton University.^[7] She earned a master's degree from NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program.^[8]

Ọnụọha's work, including The Library of Missing Datasets (2016),^[9] has explored the idea of "missing datasets," which she describes as "blank holes in otherwise data-saturated systems," such as information about citizen surveillance by the police. These gaps in modern data collection can both harm and help vulnerable communities.^[6] Ọnụọha points out that Google Maps lacks map data for Brazil's favelas, leaving out communities where more than a million people live.^[10] She is also interested in the effects of artificial intelligence and how people are classified and abstracted by data.^[6] Ọnụọha is the co-author of A People's Guide to Tech with Mother Cyborg.,^[11] an artist-led organization that creates educational guides in the form of zines and hosts workshops about emerging technology.^[12] She previously taught at Bennington College.^[7] Based in Brooklyn,^[6] she is currently an adjunct professor at New York University.^[1]

Ọnụọha's recent solo exhibitions include bitforms gallery^[13] and Forest City Gallery.^[14] Her work has been featured at the Whitney Museum of Art, the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art,^[15] Mao Jihong Arts Foundation, La Gaitê Lyrique, Transmediale Festival, The Photographers Gallery,^[16] Gropius Bau^[17], and NEON.^[18] Her public art engagements have been supported by Akademie der Kunst, Le Centre Pompidou, the Royal College of Art, the Rockefeller Foundation, and Princeton University.

Ọnụọha has been a Fulbright-National Geographic Fellow and an artist in residence at Eyebeam Center for Art & Technology, Studio XX, Data & Society Research Institute, Columbia University’s Tow Center, and the Royal College of Art.^[19]