Emily Feinstein grew up in a New York suburb, with her dads woodshop in the basement. Working for years with her father, a furniture maker, she developed a facility in woodworking and a love for wood as a medium. She studied and worked in film for several years before beginning her visual arts practice. The elements of narrative and time in film are fundamental to her later installations and sculpture. Feinstein went back to school and received an MFA from the Milton Avery School of the Arts, Bard College in 1992.

Since then, Feinstein has built installations at Socrates Sculpture Park, Katonah Museum, Islip Art Museum, Long Island University, the Brooklyn Public Library, and Governors Island. More recently she’s had two exhibits: “Wood Drawings and Configurations” at 490 Atlantic Gallery; and an installation at the Five Myles Plus Space. Her work has also been shown at Park Place Gallery, Odetta, Leslie Heller Workspace, Art in General, Sideshow, Metaphor, and Kentler Galleries. In 2019 she co-curated with Matt Freedman and collaborated with six artists in the exhibit “Billboards and Broadsides” at the Humanities Gallery of Long Island University.

Feinstein has been awarded residencies at Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Blue Mountain Colony, MacDowell Colony, and Yaddo. She’s received grants from Change Inc., Adolph Gottlieb, and the Center for Contemporary Performance Art. Her work has been reviewed by Roberta Smith, Ken Johnson, and Grace Gleuck in the New York Times and other online publications.