Born in Newbury, VT, Julia Whitney Barnes spent two decades in Brooklyn, before moving to the Poughkeepsie. Whitney Barnes received her BFA from Parsons School of Design and her MFA from Hunter College. Her work is executed in a variety of media, from oil paintings, ceramic sculptures, murals, drawings, etchings, and site-specific installations. Whitney Barnes has created site-specific installations at Arts Brookfield/Brooklyn, NY, the Wilderstein Sculpture Biennial, Rhinebeck, NY; The Trolley Barn/Fall Kill Creative Works, Poughkeepsie, NY; GlenLily Grounds, Newburgh, NY; ArtsWestchester, White Plains, NY; Gowanus Public Arts Initiative, Brooklyn, NY; Space All Over/Fjellerup Bund i Bund & Grund, Fjellerup, Denmark; Lower Manhattan Cultural Council/Sirovitch Senior Center, New York, NY; Brooklyn School of Inquiry, Brooklyn, NY; New York City Department of Transportation, New York, NY; and Figment Sculpture Garden, Governors Island, NY and among other locations. 

Julia Whitney Barnes has exhibited in the United States and internationally, including at Front Room Gallery, Brooklyn, NY/New York, NY; Brooklyn Historical Society, The Old Stone House, and Trestle Gallery, all Brooklyn, NY; Mattaewan Gallery, Beacon, NY; Cunneen Hackett Arts Center, and WomensWork Gallery, both Poughkeepsie, NY; Institute of Contemporary Art and International Crytopzoology Museum, both Portland, ME, and Siena Art Institute, Italy, among many others. She was awarded fellowships from New York State Council on the Arts administered through Arts Mid-Hudson, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Abbey Memorial Fund for Mural Painting/National Academy of Fine Arts, and the Gowanus Public Art Initiative, among others. She is on faculty at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, NY.