Kim Charles Kay is an American interdisciplinary artist.

Life and career

Kim Charles Kay was born in

Olympia, Washington Olympia is the capital of the U.S. state of Washington and the county seat and largest city of Thurston County. It is southwest of the state's most populous city, Seattle, and is a cultural center of the southern Puget Sound region. European ...

, and raised in "tiny timber towns" in the Pacific Northwest. She studied psychology, women's studies, and video & media theory, at

Washington State University Washington State University (Washington State, WSU, or informally Wazzu) is a public land-grant research university with its flagship, and oldest, campus in Pullman, Washington. Founded in 1890, WSU is also one of the oldest land-grant unive ...

and

The Evergreen State College The Evergreen State College is a public liberal arts college in Olympia, Washington. Founded in 1967, it offers a non-traditional undergraduate curriculum in which students have the option to design their own study towards a degree or follow a p ...

, before graduating from

Rhode Island School of Design The Rhode Island School of Design (RISD , pronounced "Riz-D") is a private art and design school in Providence, Rhode Island. The school was founded as a coeducational institution in 1877 by Helen Adelia Rowe Metcalf, who sought to increase the ...

with a BFA in Painting. Kay collaborates with artists, educators, and researchers on projects. Kay and artist

Lisi Raskin Lisi Raskin (born 1974) is a New York-based artist known for creating large-scale, architectural environments that refer to the often clandestine fallout shelters and missile silos constructed during the Cold War. Raskin performs rigorous field ...

initiated ''MOTORPARK'', a mobile collaborative platform at the ICA Maine College of Art, and held a discussion on the project at Marianne Boesky Gallery in New York City. Kay made costumes and set pieces fo
Jeanine Oleson's
''Hear, Here,'' an experimental opera that was presented at the New Museum in 2014. Kay's installation project, ''A Version of One Truth'', ''was'' presented by the

Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft KMAC Museum is an American art museum that "connects people to Art and Creative Practice". The museum is a 501c3 organization located in the West Main District of downtown Louisville, Kentucky History The museum was founded in 1981 as the Ken ...

in 2015, where she was an artist-in-residence. As a teaching artist, Kay has created educational programs at Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens, NY, and at the

Drawing Center The Drawing Center is a Manhattan, New York, museum and a nonprofit exhibition space that focuses on the exhibition of drawings, both historical and contemporary. History The Drawing Center was founded by former assistant curator of drawings at ...

in New York, NY. Recently she was awarded an artist residency at the Bubbler at Madison Public Library, in Madison, WI. Also in Madison, she co-founded ''EVERYDAY GAY HOLIDAY'', "an unusual new art and literary studio." Her installation ''Cat Mummies Came First'', which was viewable night and day through a gallery's garage window from March 7 to May 30, 2020, at Sheherazade art space in

Old Louisville Old Louisville is a historic district and neighborhood in central Louisville, Kentucky, United States. It is the third largest such district in the United States, and the largest preservation district featuring almost entirely Victorian architect ...

, was "one of the few safe, in-person art experiences in Louisville" when museums and galleries closed to the public due to the

Covid-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

. Critic Megan Bickel, in reviewing the exhibition, wrote that "''Cat Mummies Came First'' grants observation of a lived experience as a juxtaposed historical and contemporaneous moment—one with remarkable affection for those of the present, past, and future. This feels like a prize or gift in this world that has changed with effervescence over-night."

Awards and honors

* 2017 Bubbler at Madison Public Library residency * 2016 Vermont Studio Center Fellowship * 2012 Quimby Foundation Grant * 2010 Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship, U.S. Department of State

References

External links

Website for Kim Charles Kay

Kim Charles Kay at New Museum Archive

Kim Charles Kay at Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft

MOTORPARK at MECA

MotorPark at Marianne Boesky Gallery

Artist in Residence Kim Charles Kay at Madison Public Library
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kay, Kim Charles Living people People from Olympia, Washington Artists from Brooklyn Year of birth missing (living people)