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Jordan Stein is a curator and writer based in San Francisco. He is the author of Stephen Kaltenbach: Portrait of My Father (J&L Books, 2025), Miyoko Ito: Heart of Hearts (Pre-Echo Press, 2024), a New York Times Best Art Book of the Year, and Rip Tales: Jay DeFeo’s Estocada & Other Pieces (Soberscove Press, 2021).

In 2017, he founded Cushion Works, an exhibition space in the Mission District that aims to link past and present through the varied presentation of critical—and often overlooked—artworks, histories, and ideas. He has independently organized exhibitions at venues such as Artists Space, Yale Union, the Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive, San Francisco City Hall, The Glass House, Matthew Marks Gallery, Fraenkel Gallery, and The Renaissance Society at the University of Chicago, where he formerly served as Curator of Special Projects. He was a Curator at KADIST, San Francisco from 2016–2022.

Jordan is a co-founder of the interdisciplinary collaborative group Will Brown, which realized over three dozen exhibitions and programs in their Mission District storefront from 2012–2015 before working parasitically with other organizations. With Will Brown, he is the author of Bruce Conner: Brass Handles. He has taught at Williams College, the San Francisco Art Institute, and California College of the Arts.

Recent press: New York Times, The Brooklyn Rail, Frieze, The New Yorker, and KQED.

mail@jordanstein.com