Kiah Celeste (B.1994, Brooklyn, NY) is a multi-dimensional artist whose work has transcended fitting into one category or medium. Upon completing a BFA in Photography in 2016, Kiah moved into three dimensional production. She has completed artist residencies and exhibitions within the US and internationally including Lisbon, Barcelona, NYC, Chicago and Miami. In 2021, Celeste received the inaugural 21C Artadia Award in Louisville, KY. Her work has been acquired by the Speed Art Museum, KMAC Museum and the UK Art Museum. She has been featured in Hyperallergic, The Wall Street Journal, Burnaway, and ArtForum. Celeste currently prepares for a solo exhibition in NYC and several art fairs in Europe.
Constantly searching and gleaning objects from urban and industrial environments, Kiah Celeste forages for materials that speak to her. Her practice consists of a few components, to which Celeste often incorporates a motif to establish a visual cadence of repetition, balance, motion and variation. Her free-standing work includes almost exclusively discarded or secondhand items, and minimal hardware, creating something new and fortuitous out of decay. Recent stretched spandex framed works explore the meeting of sculpture and two-dimensionality while retaining foundations in found materiality and physics. By asserting the cruciality of sustainability, Kiah’s work negates the gratuitous nature of buying new, synthetic materials only to enter into inevitable disorder over time. Although these works are made with primarily synthetic, industrial and household materials, the forms they take on allude the organic, the surreal and non-function. By adhering to rigorous principles of sustainability and low intervention, she often challenges physics, with compositions which carefully balance through tension, weight, flexibility and gravity. These texturally rich compositions highlight the inherent beauty of the objects, while retiring their original practical functions.
With a multifarious identity as a Black and Jewish woman, both feminine and androgynous, and introverted and social, among other contrasting combinations and in-betweens, the sense of her un-belonging finds respite in the embrace of seemingly disparate materials to create a cohesive whole, finding freedom in self, the world, and creative practice.
Kiah Celeste is jointly represented by DOCUMENT and Swivel Gallery
Education
SUNY College at Purchase
BFA Photography 2012 - 2016
Solo Exhibitions
(Upcoming) Swivel Gallery - May 2025
New York, NY
‘To Be Held For A Long Time’
DOCUMENT - May - August 2023
Lisbon, Portugal
‘What In The World Becomes Me’
DOCUMENT - APRIL - MAY 2022
CHICAGO, IL
‘All The Best, Kiah Celeste’
Swivel gallery - January - February 2022
Brooklyn, NY
‘The Right Side Down’
KMAC Museum - August 2021 - November 2021
Louisville, KY
‘Before It Falls Apart’
Quappi Projects - January 2021 - March 2021
Louisville, KY
‘It Is What Is Not Yet Known’
Group Exhibitions
(Upcoming) Salon 94 - April 2025
New York, NY
‘Luminaries’
Mary M. Torrgler Fine Arts Center - November 2024 - February 2025
Newport News, VA
‘Reflections: Surface And Substance’
Swivel Gallery - September 2024
New York, NY
‘Myriad’
Swivel Gallery - June - August 2023
Brooklyn, NY
(2 person exhibition, with Eric Oglander) ‘Woolgather’
Document - April 2023
Chicago, IL
Expo Chicago
Speed Art Museum - March - August 2023
Louisville, KY
‘Rounding The Circle: The Mary and Alfred Shands Collection’
Document - February 2023
Los Angeles, CA
Felix Art Fair
KMAC Museum - February - April 2023
Louisville, KY
‘Search And Rescue’
Gang Gang - September 2022
Indianapolis, IN
Butter Art Fair
Swivel Saugerties - July - August 2022
Saugerties, NY
‘The Shape Of Things’
The Carnegie - March - August 2022
Covington, KY
‘A Thought Is A River’
Schick Gallery - March - April 2022
Saratoga Springs, NY
‘Humor Me’
Swivel Gallery - December 2021
Miami beach, Fl
NADA Miami
KMAC Museum - April 2021 - August 2021
Louisville, KY
‘Reflect, Reframe, Remake, Remodel’
HEAT by Noisebody - April 2021
'HEAT' Visual album
Georgetown College, Anne Wright Wilson fine arts gallery - January - March 2021
Georgetown, KY
‘A Howl Is Also A Prayer’
Kennedy Heights Art Center - January - March 2020
Cincinnati, OH
‘Revolutionary: Being American Today’
Majlis Pop Up - October 2019 Abu Dhabi, UAE
‘Sheikh Shack’
Dadapost — May - June 2018 Berlin, DE
‘Insolence: The Prerogative of Youth’
Residencies
2025
(Upcoming) Suzanne Jackson Foundation Inaugural AIR
Savannah, GA
Edward F. Albee Foundation
Montauk, NY
2021
Josephine Sculpture Park
Frankfort, KY
2019
Centre D’Arte La Rectoria
Sant Pere De Vilamajor, Spain
Grants
2021
Artadia 21C Louisville Award
Inaugural 10K unrestricted grant recipient
2020
Artist Relief Trust (ART)
Elevator Artist Grant
Foundation For Contemporary Arts
FCA Emergency Grant
Louisville Arts Network and Lift Up Lou
Louisville Arts Network Micro-Commission
Bibliography
Kelly, Brian P. Review of NADA Miami 2023 Review: An Oasis Away From the Beach, The Wall Street Journal,
8 December 2023
Gemima, Clare. Review: Ten Artists Heating Up Miami Right Now, Widewalls,
7 December 2023
Bickel, Megan. Refuse, Reused: A Review of Kiah Celeste at Document, NewCity,
9 May 2022
Art Forum Art Guide MUST SEE list
May 2022
Weiss, Natalie. Review: The Graceful Instability of Kiah Celeste’s Art, Hyperallergic,
22 September 2021
Filchak, Ryan. Review of Kiah Celeste at Quappi Projects, Louisville, Burnaway,
4 March 2021
Kissel, Hunter. Review of It Is What Is Not Yet Known, Ruckus Journal,
28 February 2021
Starowitz, Sean. Review of ‘It Is What Is Not Yet Known’, Under Main Newsletter,
27 February 2021
Oberdick, Jessica. Review of ‘A Howl is Also a Prayer’, Ruckus Journal,
26 February 2021
“Art of Gravity, Ep. 07 Kiah Celeste's It Is What Is Not Yet Known, with John Brooks and Mary Clore.”
Gnadinger, L Autumn, director. Art Of Gravity, episode 7, Ruckus, 2021.
25 February 2021
Weiss, Natalie. Review of In Kiah Celeste Exhibit, Discarded Materials Find New Life, Wfpl,
16 February 2021
Carstens, Ian. “Kiah Celeste: Glass Breakfast Q&A.” Ruckus Louisville,
19 August 2020
Bickel, Megan. Q&A: Kiah Celeste and Material Agency :: AEQAI. AEQAI RSS
27 June 2020
Noah Barker, Spring Themes :: Obsolete Staircases
Album Artwork
5 June 2020
Christopher Carter, “Refusals and Offerings: Revolutionary Identity at the Kennedy Heights Art Center” :: AEQAI
15 February 2020