Kelly Tsai is an award-winning multidisciplinary artist & performer based in Brooklyn, New York. She is currently working at the intersection of music, dance, photography, film, & technology.

In 2025, Kelly's "SKyGiRLS" photo series has been selected to be exhibited at Rotterdam Photo Festival, Exposure Photography Festival / Contemporary Calgary, published in Create! Magazine Issue No. 49, and as a Passepartout Photo Prize Honorable Mention. As a dancer and choreographer, she debuted as a burlesque performer at "Hot & Fresh" at House of Yes and will be premiering a new pole dance solo at Incredipole's Pride Showcase.

In 2024, Kelly's "SKyGiRLS" photo series was published in F-Stop Magazine, selected as a Lensculture Emerging Talent Award Editor's Pick, and exhibited at Satellite Art Fair in Brooklyn, NY. She premiered solo choreographic works as a pole dancer at Incredipole's 9th Anniversary Leather Party and as an experimental heels dancer at Folly's Haven at ArtX Gallery. She was a featured pole performer in Dey Phoenix's ensemble at Body & Pole. She also participated in Performance Space New York's Summer Studio creating new works in music and dance.

In 2023, her episodic television pilot was selected for development by the Athena Film Festival Writers’ Lab. Her poetry and sound design were commissioned for Hii Magazine’s “PUNK IN THE POST-APOCALYPSE” issue. Her “SKyGiRLS” photo series was also selected to exhibit at SUPERFINE! Art Fair (DC), Armstrong Gallery (CT), and Aqua Art Fair (Miami) and as a Curious Elixirs Curious Creators Grant Finalist (top 3% of over 1400 entries).

In 2022, Kelly was commissioned by Fotografiska x VICE to write and perform a series of original poems inspired by the “Andy Warhol: Photo Factory” exhibit. As a dancer, she performed as a vogue femme performer at the Socrates Sculpture Park and the Princess Grace Awards Gala and was selected for the GLUE x Trisk Workshop and NVA & Guests Workshop as a contemporary dancer.

In 2021, Kelly's solo dance works and films were presented by Abrons Arts Center, Asian American Writers' Workshop, and developed at Movement Research Center. Kelly also composed, performed, and produced the music for these works. Her SKyGiRLS photo series (where she embodies intriguing women of the Chinese diaspora) was exhibited at Camera of the Month Club’s 2021 “The Personal is Political” group show.

She was also selected for 5th Wall Forum’s 2021 Immersive Storytelling Connectors program and NYU’s 2021 ITP Camp for interactive creative technology. Her poetry was featured at the 20th Anniversary of Lincoln Center’s La Casita and in a typography collaboration with artist Olga Mezhibovskaya and the School of Visual Arts.

In 2020, she was accepted into Brooklyn Filmmakers Collective to develop her first narrative feature screenplay, which was previously advanced to second round consideration for the Sundance Screenwriters' Lab.

In 2019, she was chosen for the Adidas Nitejogger #Beatmakers Lab for music production and released four instrumental tracks. Her award-winning animated film collaboration with Ryan Hartley Smith, “To Find Your Place in the World,” was projected on the Manhattan Bridge for the 2019 Light Year art exhibit.

In 2018, Kelly was an actress on the HBO series “Random Acts of Flyness.” Her memoir-in-progress, The Invisible Word, won the 2017 New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship - Nonfiction and was nominated for the 2019 New York Community Trust Ellen Levine Prize.

Presenters & Venues (Selected Listing)

Artist Fellowships & Workshops

5th Wall Forum Connectors (VR/AR)
Athena Film Festival Writers’ Lab (Screenwriting)
Brooklyn Filmmakers Collective (Film)
Callaloo (Fiction)
Cave Canem (Poetry)
GLUE x Trisk (Dance)
NVA & Guests Workshop (Dance)
Kundiman (Poetry)
New York Foundation for the Arts (Non-Fiction Literature / Memoir)
NYU ITP Camp (VR/AR/New Media)
Rising Circle PlayRISE (Playwriting)
Voices of Our Nation Foundation (Poetry)

Artist Grants & Residencies

Asian American Arts Alliance
Asian Women’s Giving Circle
Hedgebrook
Illinois Arts Council
Lower Manhattan Cultural Council
New York Foundation for the Arts
New York Live Arts Studio Series
Poets & Writers

Special Recognition

American Association of University Women's Woman of Distinction Award
Media that Matters Film Festival Award
Honorable Mention, Passepartout Photo Prize
Finalist, Curious Elixirs Curious Creators Grant - Photography
Finalist, Brooklyn Arts Exchange Artist-In-Residence
Finalist, Public Theater Emerging Writers Group
Finalist, Creative Capital
Finalist, New York Theater Workshop Fellowship
2nd Round, Sundance Screenwriters Lab
2nd Round, Hedgebrook Screenwriters Lab

Juror / Artistic Panels

apexart (Art)
Austin Film Festival (Film)
Brooklyn Arts Council (Theater)
Hedgebrook (Multi-Genre Literature)
Kundiman (Poetry)
Leeway Foundation (Multi-Genre Arts)
The Loft Literary Fellowship (Poetry)
The Rumpus (Fiction)
Maryland State Arts Council (Poetry)