Kelli Connell (born 1974) is an American

contemporary Contemporary history, in English-language historiography, is a subset of modern history that describes the historical period from approximately 1945 to the present. Contemporary history is either a subset of the late modern period, or it is o ...

photographer. Connell is known for creating portraits, which may appear as self-portraits. Her work is held in the collections of the

Columbus Museum of Art The Columbus Museum of Art (CMA) is an art museum in downtown Columbus, Ohio. Formed in 1878 as the Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts (its name until 1978), it was the first art museum to register its charter with the state of Ohio. The museum collect ...

, the

Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits (George C. Page Museum). LACMA was founded in 19 ...

, the

Museum of Fine Arts Houston The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), is an art museum located in the Houston Museum District of Houston, Texas. With the recent completion of an eight-year campus redevelopment project, including the opening of the Nancy and Rich Kinder Build ...

, the

Museum of Contemporary Photography The Museum of Contemporary Photography (MoCP) was founded in 1976 by Columbia College Chicago as the successor to the Chicago Center for Contemporary Photography. The museum houses a permanent collection as well as the Midwest Photographers Projec ...

and the

Dallas Museum of Art The Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) is an art museum located in the Arts District of downtown Dallas, Texas, along Woodall Rodgers Freeway between St. Paul and Harwood. In the 1970s, the museum moved from its previous location in Fair Park to the Art ...

Early life and education

Kelli Connell was born in 1974 in

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma Oklahoma City (), officially the City of Oklahoma City, and often shortened to OKC, is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, it ranks 20th among United States cities in population, and ...

.> Connell took her first photography class as a junior in high school, and was influenced early on by the work of Roni Horn, Francesca Woodman, and Larry Sultan. She received her BFA in Photography and Visual Arts Studies at the University of North Texas. In 2003, Connell received her Masters in Fine Arts in Photography and a minor in Art history from Texas Woman’s University.

Artistic career

Connell became a photographer to explore how photography can raise questions. In 2011, Decode Books released her first monograph, ''Double Life,'' in which she presented 36 color photographs of two young women occupied in their day to day activities of pleasure and reflection. ''Double Life'' seeks to question ideas of identity,

gender roles A gender role, also known as a sex role, is a social role encompassing a range of behaviors and attitudes that are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for a person based on that person's sex. Gender roles are usually cent ...

, and expectations made by society on the individual. The series, which depicts a woman in a

romantic relationship Romance or romantic love is a feeling of love for, or a strong attraction towards another person, and the courtship behaviors undertaken by an individual to express those overall feelings and resultant emotions. The ''Wiley Blackwell Encycl ...

with herself, shows the "couple" having intimate and private moments in their lives. Connell uses her art to define the multiple sides of the self in the overall human experience. The portraits are also a case of identity. Connell worked with the same model over a series of years to produce the work. She is currently a professor at Columbia College Chicago.

Collections

*"Carnival", 2006,

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

, New York City *

Exhibitions

*''Double Life,''

, Columbus, Ohio, 2004 *''Kelli Connell: Photographs,'' Kendall College of Art and Design,

Ferris State University Ferris State University (FSU or Ferris) is a public university with its main campus in Big Rapids, Michigan. It was founded in 1884 and became a public institution in 1950. Ferris is the ninth-largest institutions of higher education by enrol ...

, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2009

Publications

*''Double Life.'' Seattle: Decode 2011. With Susan Bright. .

Personal life

Connell is married to sculptor Betsy Odom.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Connell, Kelli 1974 births American contemporary artists Photographers from Oklahoma Columbia College Chicago faculty Artists from Oklahoma City University of North Texas alumni American women photographers Living people American lesbian artists American women academics LGBT people from Oklahoma 21st-century American photographers 21st-century American women artists