Ellen Kirkpatrick is an artist working across kinetic sculpture, painting, video, coding, and photography. She challenges: (1) water – (2) aging – (3) myth – (4) hope – (5) biometric data under the umbrella of time. Her work is an evolving definition of abstraction, focusing on its potential as an indirect storyteller. She received her MFA from Parsons in July 2025 and accepts studio visits by appointment in Chelsea, Manhattan. These days she is painting and building large scale light and water installations.
Using my Grandmother’s live heart beat to create waves. Her Apple Watch sends her pulse to a linear actuator that moves the water to mimic how she follows my life through Find My Friends. Waves are more fun than hospital beeping.
(abstract portrait / emotional surrogate)
Acrylic, Arduino board, Apple Watch, linear actuator, metal, water
Coffee, 2025
My Aunt Judy saw me making work the past 4 years with my grandmother as she ages, and Judy wanted to join the collaboration. Coffee is a story about going blind.
My Aunt Judy saw me making work the past 4 years with my grandmother as she ages, and Judy wanted to join the collaboration. Toe Stubber is a story about going blind.
Cinderblock, mannequin foot, stuffed cat, linear actuator, gym weight, wood, metal
Weight of Water, 2023 – ongoing
Taken while surfing: by placing myself and unhoused camera beneath heavy waves I am able to experience brief bits of fear (and inescapable beauty) of the sublime. These images are the experience of capturing time and space while giving more bodily control to the natural elements. By challenging myself to keep my camera dry and head above water, this exercise forces me to join the flow of the ocean. I cannot fight the water, I instead choose to collaborate with it.
Limited edition prints
Anna Maria and Stephen Kellen Gallery
MFA Thesis Exhibition August + September 2025
Videos above:
Underwater Makeup – 2024 I put on a full face of makeup in Miami. 2.26min
City Lipsticks – 2023 I asked strangers on the streets of NYC to apply lipstick with my house-bound Grandmother. 2.26min
Below:
Judy + Keith – 2025 Love for a long time. Loop
Inquire for full videos
Earth’s Mantle, Newfoundland – 2024
Photographic studies of elemental withering of exposed earth’s mantle on a trek across the tablelands on this island in the Atlantic. Considering rainwater as a sculptor.
Limited edition prints
3D Earth’s Mantle, Newfoundland, 2024
2.5cm tectonic dance making underground ocean babies.
Projections – installation 2023
FaceTime screen recordings of New York City strangers and Grandmother putting on lipstick until she runs out.
Tripod, projector, Mark iv, new friends, countless tubes of lipstick
Screen grab
Beauty for Duty – 2024 – ongoing
During the second World War, women in the USA and Great Britain were expected to decorate themselves in bright red lipstick. Advertisements appeared eliciting female beauty as a rebellion to the war, and valiant effort to bring the troops home. Lipstick as a weapon. I replaced the women in the advertisements with Hitler, Lenin, and Stalin as they would not enjoy that.
Limited edition posters
Light Pollution – 2023 ongoing
Images of water as a separator between landmasses and their inhabitants.
Electricity, water, Hudson River, East River
Limited edition prints
Myth of Narcissus – 2023
Created in the heated pool at JFK.
Film 2.26min Screen grabs
Dior 766 – 2023
An account of lipstick.
Film 3min Screen grabs
Fibonacci Spiral – 2022
Limited edition print
Fractals – 2021
Thanks for spending the time to go through my projects. Artist bio: Born Charleston, SC, raised in small town friendly Rutherfordton, NC. Work has been shown in Photoville NYC, Aegir Boardwalks, Anna Maria and Stephen Kellen Gallery, and American Center of Photography. MFA from Parsons the New School. Co-founded La Semilla, an alternative education program in Todos Santos, México. Working in NYC.
