Who Is Jenny Odell? Age, Biography and Wiki
Born on March 18, 1984, Jenny Odell is a talented American artist, writer, and educator renowned for her innovative approach in utilizing art to explore themes of environmental and technological interfaces. As of 2025, Jenny is 41 years old. She gained significant attention for her book "How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy," which underscores the importance of disengaging from a hyper-connected world to reclaim our focus on what truly matters.
| Occupation | Writers |
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| Date of Birth | |
| Age | 39 Years |
| Birth Place | N/A |
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Popularity
Jenny Odell's Popularity over time
Height, Weight & Measurements
Jenny Odell stands at an impressive height of around 5 feet 7 inches (170 cm). Her weight is estimated to be approximately 130 lbs (59 kg). While specific body measurements are not widely publicized, Jenny is known for her approachable and curated aesthetic that resonates with her audience, often embodying an effortless blend of comfort and style in her appearances.
Family, Dating & Relationship Status
Details about Jenny Odell's family life remain relatively private, respecting her desire for confidentiality in her personal affairs. As of 2025, Jenny has been linked to several notable figures in the creative industry, however, she has not publicly confirmed any ongoing relationships. Her focus on her work and activism reveals a commitment to her career over romantic entanglements, keeping fans and the media guessing about her dating life.
Odell's book How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy (2019) is about "how to disconnect from the attention economy". The book builds on the topics that had already surfaced in her previous artistic work: our relationship to technology and how observation can be a critical action.
She explains how doing nothing can be a strategy to resist the profit-driven technology which attempts to hold our attention at all costs. Odell says doing nothing can be a refusal to take part in life online and instead re-engage with your physical surroundings.
Jonah Bromwich praised the book in a review published by The New York Times "she goes on to construct a complex, smart and ambitious book that at first reads like a self-help manual, then blossoms into a wide-ranging political manifesto." In the end, the book is a criticism of capitalism, an argument against our standard definitions of productivity
and an encouragement to re-engage with nature and local communities.
Net Worth and Salary
As of 2025, Jenny Odell's net worth is estimated to be between $1 million and $5 million. Her earnings primarily stem from her successful publishing career, speaking engagements, and her role as an educator. With her growing prominence and the success of her works, it is likely that her financial standing will continue to rise in the coming years. Additionally, her artistic endeavors and potential investments in various projects further contribute to her earnings.
Career, Business and Investments
Jenny Odell is not only celebrated for her artistic work but also for her captivating essays and public lectures. Her career encompasses a variety of roles as she teaches at Stanford University, where she inspires students with her unique insights on art and technology. Alongside her educational commitments, Jenny engages in various projects, notably in collaborations with environmental organizations, reflecting her advocacy for sustainability. Her investment in art and technological interfaces demonstrates her forward-thinking approach and commitment to combining creativity with social impact.
Social Network
Jenny Odell is active on several social media platforms, sharing her thoughts and artistic inspirations with her followers. You can find her insights on Twitter @jennyodell and explore her visual work on Instagram @jenny_odell. Her online presence is characterized by a thoughtful curation of content that resonates with her audience, making her an influential voice in contemporary discussions about technology and the environment.
Neo-Surreal is a collection of work completed while Odell was artist-in-residence at the Internet Archive in 2017. While there, she came across a large collection of BYTE, an American computing magazine, from the 1980s.
She pulled images from this archive, edited and curated in a way to highlight the surreal nature of the industry, both then and today.
In her own words,"The reconfiguration of this material highlights the ways in which such imagery, viewed in hindsight, inadvertently portrays some of the stranger and more sinister aspects that technology eventually came to embody.
For instance, one finds things like a computer wearing a policeman's hat and wielding a riding crop (evoking surveillance) or a pill opening to reveal a computer chip (evoking biometrics). Similarly to Richard Prince in his Cowboys series, I've done nothing here except to remove the text, restore some backgrounds, and re-title the images."
Education
Jenny Odell holds a B.A. in Art History from Sacramento State University and an M.F.A. in Art and Technology from University of California, Berkeley. Her rigorous academic background, combined with her passion for art and writing, underpins her contributions to both fields. Jenny’s education has not only shaped her artistic vision but also enhanced her ability to engage critically with the issues she addresses in her work.
Jenny Odell (born 1986) is an American multidisciplinary artist, writer, and educator based in Oakland, California. She taught Internet art and digital/physical design at Stanford University from 2013 to 2021. She wrote The New York Times best-selling book How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy (2019).
