Kelli Connell Last updated January 24, 2026 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 , and expectations made by society on the individual. The series, which depicts a woman in a romantic relationship 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. [ 3]
Until 2025, she served as a professor at Columbia College Chicago , where she taught, mentored, and "established herself as part of an important group of Chicago photographers exploring a distinctive brand of psychological portraiture." [ 7]
Group Exhibitions FEEL ME , Trapholt Museum of Modern Art and Design, Denmark, 2024Gorgeousness , Benrubi Gallery, New York, NY, 2024o_ Man! , Kelli Connell and Natalie Krick, Silver Eye Center for Photography, Pittsburgh, PA, 2024Traces on the Landscape , Princeton University Art Museum , Princeton, NJ, 2023All Roads are Open: Traveling Women Photographers Kunstforum Hermann Stenner, Bielefeld, Germany, 2023OFF-SPRING: New Generations, 21c Museum, Chicago, IL, 2023Refracting Histories, Museum of Contemporary Photography , Chicago, IL, 2022Rewriting Art History, Photographic Center Northwest, Seattle, WA, 2022Gaze Maze II: Seeing Double, Elsa Art Space, Bielefeld, Germany, 2022Tomorrow , and Tomorrow , and Tomorrow, The Design Museum of Chicago, Chicago, IL, 2022Collaborating with the Archive, Filter Photo, Chicago, IL, 2021Selections from the Permanent Collection: Contemporary Art, Westmont Ridley-Tree Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, California, 2021Keeper of the Hearth , Houston Center for Photography, Houston, TX, 2020 [ 14] Solo Exhibitions Living with Modernism: Kelli Connell's Pictures for Charis and Double Life, Elmhurst Art Museum, Elmhurst, IL, 2026 [ 15] Center for Creative Photography , Tucson, AZ Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH, 2025 High Museum of Art , Atlanta, GA, 2024 [ 16] Pictura Gallery, Bloomington, IN Silver Eye Center for Photography, Pittsburgh, PA, 2023 Sheldon Museum of Art , Lincoln, NE Blue Sky Gallery, Portland, OR, 2022 Center for Photography Woodstock, NY Alice Austen House, Staten Island, NY, 2021 [ 14] Double Life, Columbus Museum of Art , Columbus, Ohio, 2004 [ 17] Kelli Connell: Photographs, Kendall College of Art and Design, Ferris State University , Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2009 [ 18] Interviews Kelli Connell - Episode 73, PhotoWork with Sasha Wolf, February 29, 2024 [ 19] Q+A: Kelli Connell, Strange Fire with Jess T. Dugan, January 4, 2018 [ 20] Personal life Connell is married to sculptor Betsy Odom. [ 21]
References ↑ Kelli Connell (2007). "Bio & Resume" . Kelli Connell. Archived from the original on January 29, 2012. Retrieved January 22, 2012 . ↑ Leo Costello. "Kelli Connell: Double Life" . Art Lies. Archived from the original on February 26, 2013. Retrieved January 22, 2012 . 1 2 Martha Schwendener (2007). "Art in Review; Kelli Connell" . Arts . New York Times . Retrieved January 22, 2012 . ↑ Christopher Harrity (2012). "Artist Spotlight: Kelli Connell" . Photography . The Advocate . Archived from the original on January 24, 2012. Retrieved January 22, 2012 . 1 2 3 "Kelli Connell | Museum of Contemporary Photography" . www.mocp.org . Archived from the original on August 5, 2021. Retrieved August 5, 2021 . ↑ "Kelli Connell and the Intimate Other" . In the In-Between . March 8, 2013. ↑ MacMillan, Kyle (January 22, 2026). "Photographer Kelli Connell steps into the frame with expansive Elmhurst show" . WBEZ . Retrieved January 23, 2026 . ↑ "Giggle, 2002" . columbusmuseum.org . January 27, 2016. ↑ "Giggle - DMA Collection Online" . www.dma.org . ↑ "Convertible Kiss | LACMA Collections" . collections.lacma.org . ↑ "Carnival" . Metropolitan Museum of Art . Retrieved January 9, 2020 . ↑ "Museum of Contemporary Photography" . www.mocp.org . Archived from the original on August 5, 2021. Retrieved August 5, 2021 . ↑ "Kelli Connell Head to Head" . mfah.org . 1 2 "Square Space" (PDF) . static1.squarespace.com . February 11, 2025. ↑ "Living with Modernism Kelli Connell's Pictures for Charis and Double Life" . Elmhurst Art Museum . Retrieved January 23, 2026 . ↑ "Kelli Connell: Pictures for Charis" . High Museum of Art . Retrieved February 20, 2025 . ↑ "Kelli Connell" . LENSCRATCH . February 18, 2012. ↑ "Kelli Connell: Photographs" . kcad.ferris.edu . Retrieved September 8, 2020 . [ permanent dead link ] ↑ "Kelli Connell – PhotoWork Foundation" . photowork.foundation . February 25, 2024. Retrieved February 20, 2025 . ↑ "Q&A: Kelli Connell" . Strange Fire . Retrieved February 20, 2025 . ↑ Maloney, Meghan (March 8, 2013). "Kelli Connell and the Intimate Other" . In the In-Between . Retrieved January 9, 2020 . External links
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