Kristin Kelly

Kristin Kelly is an educator in Philadelphia with 14 years of experience teaching multiple grades and subjects, from early childhood education to high school English. She graduated with a degree in English from Bloomsburg University, where she encountered the writings of Frantz Fanon, a figure who remains central to Afromation Avenue’s practices and mission.

In the classroom, Kelly develops interdisciplinary units that examine culture, representation, and power. Her favorite unit to date, Black Horror Noire, explored film through a psychoanalytical lens, expanding the definition of horror to include colonial power, the erosion of identity, and racial terror embedded within domestic space. Her interest in systems and space extends beyond teaching into research. She has written papers such as “The Feminization of Poverty” and “The Human Terrain System”, as well as her graduate dissertation, “The Lack of Green Spaces in Predominantly Black Neighborhoods,” which examined environmental inequities in urban communities. This focus on representation and environment also informs her artistic practice. A photographer at heart, Kelly’s work examines the human condition, urban decay, and the “underworld” of subway systems in cities she visits. As a cofounder of Afromation Avenue, she integrates photography with drawings inspired by her surroundings. Her favorite piece to date, Black Lives, Take Up Space, depicts a cityscape with a Black child doing a wheelie, based on a child she photographed years earlier. A self-taught digital artist, Kelly continues to merge her photography with original illustrations, extending her exploration of space, visibility, and identity across mediums.