Stacey Kirby

Kirby is an interdisciplinary artist from North Carolina, a daughter of a court reporter and a believer in freedom through creative embodiment. Kirby’s ‘performative interactions' combine installation and performance in alternative, private and public spaces. Fueled by the current political climate and issues of citizenship, Kirby invites visitors to become active participants in her work to empower the voice within all of us. These performative interactions foster conversation about community, civil rights, and belonging in the United States. Kirby uses humor to reinvent the bureaucratic process in order to empower people to share their voice. At the Gibbes, she will perform I AM, which explores gender identity and discrimination.

Among her many honors, Kirby has been the recipient of ArtPrize’s Juried Grand Prize, a NC Arts Council Artist Fellowship for Visual Artists and nominated for the Anonymous Was A Woman Award and the 1858 Prize. Kirby has also been awarded artist residencies throughout the U.S. including the Headlands Center for the Arts (Sausalito, CA), the Atlantic Center for the Arts (New Smyrna Beach, FL) and Artspace (Raleigh, NC).

Kirby's performances take place in a various environments such as vacant historic buildings, protests, festivals as well as traditional art spaces. Kirby has performed and exhibited at ArtPrize 8 (Grand Rapids, MI), the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art (Winston-Salem, NC), the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University (Durham, NC), Contemporary Art Museum (Raleigh, NC), North Carolina Museum of Art, the Mint Museum of Craft and Design (Charlotte, NC), Bard College, Flux Factory (Queens, NY), Fraction Workspace, (Chicago, IL), California State University in Fresno, Wellesley College (MA) and District Fine Arts, (Washington, DC). Her work is represented in the Duke University Rare Book Collection and other private collections. Kirby has a dual degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in Studio Art and in Visual Communications in School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

I AM will be performed at the Gibbes Museum on the following days/times. Participation is free and open to the public.

Wednesday, September 27, 7–8PM

Thursday, September 28, 10AM–1PM

Saturday, September 30, 1–4PM

Tuesday, October 3, 10AM–1PM

Wednesday, October 4, 5–8PM