When working on a piece, Kelsey feel in fleeting moments that it's come to life. Giving them bright bows and dark memories, bringing them to reality with whispered stories. Working with her own personal narratives to develop a darkly whimsical illustration by building a new story that reinvents a past moment or a current truth.
She sees a beautiful darkness in childhood and nostalgia, in the way memories shift and shudder as we grow further apart from them. Like looking at the drawings of a child's book before reading the story, she invites others to find pieces of themselves hidden in the details of her work where childhood exists somewhere between the fairytale and the nightmare. We find parallels back to youth in our interactions as adults, navigating our lives affected by our pasts and our stories.
Kelsey Bowen grew up in rural California, spending hot, dusty summers making up stories and picking thistles from her socks. Her figurative sculptures serve as vessels for her self-reflection and storytelling in clay, inspired by memories from her youth and interactions with her peers as an adult. While often dark in concept, her pieces build an unsettling and surreal landscape where the viewer is both comforted and disturbed; encouraging closer inspection through friendly colours and playful characters before delivering an unsettling detail.
She received her BFA in Ceramics from the California College of the Arts, going on to continue creating work as a long-term artist in residence at the Red Lodge Clay Center in Montana. Kelsey has exhibited her work in various corners of the West Coast from L.A. to Oregon, Montana, Idaho and Wyoming.
She is currently working as a professional artist, part-time educator and sketchbook doodler in Western Montana.
SELECTED SHOWS
2021
Dreambags and Jaguar Shoes, Group Show, Kirk Gallery, Denmark
2020
Duo Exhibition: Margaret Keelan and Kelsey Bowen, In Tandem Gallery, Bakersville, NC
Art on the Move: Petite Works, Natsoulas Gallery, Davis, CA
Grace of Dexterity, Group Exhibition, Art Spirit Gallery, Coeur d’Alene, ID
The Clay Studio National, Clay Studio Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA
5th Annual Ceramics Invitational, Radius Gallery, Missoula, MT
Art Auction 52, Yellowstone Art Museum, Billings, MT
March Featured Artist, Red Lodge Clay Center, Red Lodge, MT
Beyond the Brickyard Annual Juried Exhibition, Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts, Helena, MT
2019
North by Northwest, Yellowstone Art Museum, Billings, MT
This Then There, Red Lodge Clay Center, Red Lodge, Montana
Spring Folly, Invited Artist for May 2019, Art Spirit Gallery in Coeur d'Alene, ID
Bestiarum Vocabulum, Radius Gallery, Missoula, MT
Small & MIGHTY, Curated exhibition by Kensuke Yamada, Clay Studio of Missoula, Missoula, MT
Unearthed, Northwest College, Powell, WY
Ryniker-Morrison: Red Lodge Clay Center, Long-term Artist in Residence winter exhibition, Rocky Mountain College, Billings, MT
2018
Material Memory, Long Term Artist in Residence Group Exhibition, Red Lodge Clay Center, Red Lodge, MT
Red Lodge Clay Center, Group exhibition, Ryniker-Morrison Gallery, Billings, MT
Opening Reception: Red Lodge Clay Center 2018, Group exhibition, Northwest Gallery in Powell, WY
2017
Animal Nature - Creatures in Clay, The Potter's Studio, Berkeley, CA
Buried in the Yard, Senior thesis solo exhibition, California College of the Arts, Oakland, California
2016
Rocks and Socks, California College of the Arts, Oakland, CA
Across the Table, Across the Land, NCECA 2016, Kansas City, MO
Lineage: Mentor-ship and Learning Exhibition, The American Museum of Ceramic Arts, Los Angeles, CA
California College of the Arts Ceramics Guild Exhibition, Isabelle Percy West Gallery,Oakland, CA
2015
Rock, Silica, Soap Box, California College of the Arts, Oakland, CA