Bio
Bill Powers is an American art gallery owner who owns Half Gallery in New York City along with partners Andy Spade and James Frey best known as a judge of the reality competition television series Work of Art: The Next Great Artist, since 2010.
Powers also co-founded ExhibitionA.com, an online art site that commissions editioned prints. He also helps curate the rare book room at the Gagaosian Shop on Madison Avenue.
His gallery's past clients are an eccletic mix of notables, including Chloe Sevigny, Daphne Guinness, KAWS and Mario Sorrenti.
Powers' path in contemporary art first manifested itself in 1997 when he became the editor-in-chief of Blackbook magazine, where he remained off-and-on until 2005.
He has also written about art and culture for other prominent titles including The New York Times, W, Paper, Vanity Fair, Muse, Details, and Purple Fashion, a magazine he occasionally still contributes to.
Through his extensive editorial work, Powers has interviewed some of today's preeminent contemporary artists from around the world, including Damien Hirst, Jeff Koons, Kara Walker, Ed Ruscha, George Condo, Rashid Johnson and John Currin.
In addition, Powers is an ardent art collector with an impressive collection of works by Alec Soth, Richard Prince, Elizabeth Peyton, Tom Sachs, Irving Penn, and Dana Schutz, among others. The first piece of art he ever bought was a photograph of ToeJam the Clown by Terry Richardson in 1998.
Powers is currently on the board of the non-profit RxArt, an organisation that places contemporary art in hospitals and healing environments.
He resides in New York with his wife, fashion designer Cynthia Rowley, and their two daughters.