Scott Kiernan is an artist living and working in New York City. In his video, photo and installation works, electronically synthesized and photographic elements interact to address their own materiality and means of distribution. He is particularly interested in how meaning shifts through stages of translation via technology, speech and syntax.
He was founder and co-director of Louis V E.S.P., an artist-run gallery and performance space in Brooklyn, NY (2010- 2012) and now of E.S.P. TV (2011-present), a nomadic TV studio that explores the televisual as a medium for broadcast collaborations. This project also formed UNIT 11, a transmission-based residency program operating from a former ENG van turned mobile electronic studio. Kiernan also directs Various/Artists, a project space in New York City and imprint producing audio/visual releases by artists working across diverse media.
He has exhibited and performed internationally in venues such as Museum of Modern Art, New Museum, Museum of Arts and Design, Swiss Institute/Contemporary Art, Storefront for Art and Architecture, Whitney Museum of American Art, PERFORMA, Harvard Art Museums, P.S. 1, Anthology Film Archives, Mixed Greens, Ballroom Marfa, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and the Center for International Contemporary Art in Rome.
He was founder and co-director of Louis V E.S.P., an artist-run gallery and performance space in Brooklyn, NY (2010- 2012) and now of E.S.P. TV (2011-present), a nomadic TV studio that explores the televisual as a medium for broadcast collaborations. This project also formed UNIT 11, a transmission-based residency program operating from a former ENG van turned mobile electronic studio. Kiernan also directs Various/Artists, a project space in New York City and imprint producing audio/visual releases by artists working across diverse media.
He has exhibited and performed internationally in venues such as Museum of Modern Art, New Museum, Museum of Arts and Design, Swiss Institute/Contemporary Art, Storefront for Art and Architecture, Whitney Museum of American Art, PERFORMA, Harvard Art Museums, P.S. 1, Anthology Film Archives, Mixed Greens, Ballroom Marfa, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and the Center for International Contemporary Art in Rome.
︎CV ︎︎︎ ︎ SELECTED PRESS︎︎︎
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
Syntax Workers, Various/Artists, NY, NY, June 2024
Scott Kiernan/Victoria Keddie, Safe Gallery, Brooklyn NY, Jan 18 – Feb 17, 2019
Tilt Up, Pan Left, Essex Flowers, New York, NY, July 30, 2017
E.S.P. TV: WORK, Pioneer Works, Brooklyn NY, Feb. 10 - March 26, 2017
You Don't Say Much, Do You?, Swiss Institute/Contemporary Art, NY NY, Feb. 26, 2016
E.S.P. TV: Pyramidal, Harvard Art Museums, November 6- Dec. 31, 2014
The Five Live Lo-Fi, Kling and Bang, Reykjavik, 2014
E.S.P. TV, Museum of Arts and Design, NY, NY, Feb 23 - May 11, 2013
BEING (the Critical History Project) as E.S.P. TV, Storefront for Art and Architecture, New York City, 2013
Once around the block (twice), NurtureArt, Brooklyn, NY, 2011
CMIKB, Mixed Greens, NY, NY, 2010
Devils Triangles (Reprise), Dam-Stuhltrager, Brooklyn, NY, 2008
Half and Have Knots, The Lab, San Francisco, 2007
SELECTED SCREENINGS, PERFORMANCES, AND GROUP EXHIBITIONS
Live video score for Shelley Hirsch: And So it Was and Was and WaAAass, Roulette Intermedia, Brooklyn NY, January 23, 2024
Disegno in Motion, Marymount College, New York, NY, October 19 - December 5, 2023
.MOV: Denver Month of Video, Denver, Colorado; July 2023
Abasement, Artists Space, New York, NY, Dec 5, 2022, Oct 9, 2023, Feb 12, 2024
Untitled Art Fair, Miami Beach FL, December 2022
MV Carbon & Charlemagne Palestine w/ Scott Kiernan, Roulette Intermedia, Brooklyn, Nov 6, 2022
Intermediale Festival of Audiovisual Forms, Galeria RIng, Poland, October 15-Nov 24, 2022
Transient Visions, Johnson City, NY, October 21-22, 2022
Vector Hack, Zagreb, Croatia, October 1-8, 2022
Light Matter Film Festival, Alfred University, NY, 2021
Vision Fest, Roulette Intermedia, Brooklyn NY, July 2022
MV Carbon & Scott Kiernan, Printed Matter St Marks / Swiss Institute, 2021
Ann Arbor Film Festival, 2021
Performa Telethon, November 2020
Studio Sound: Suzanne Ciani with E.S.P. TV, Museum of Modern Art, New York, June 2020
Memphis Variations 3, Times Square NYC, San Francisco Art Institute/ ZAZ10TSQ, June 2020
Eau De Nowhere, Microscope Gallery, Brooklyn NY, May 2020
Optosonic Tea, Parrish Museum, April 26
Fracto Film Festival, ACUD Kunsthaus, Berlin, May 23-26
Salem, Spirit Level, Drawing Center, New York NY, March 11, 2019
Performing Media, University of Indiana South Bend, Feb 18 - March 1, 2019
“Salem”, Spirit Level, Drawing Center, New York, NY, March 11
Various/Artists, Printed Matter St. Marks at Swiss Institute, New York, NY, Nov 11, 2018
Category 6, Radiator, Long Island City, NY, 3-person exhibition, Sept 28 - Dec 7, 2018
White Columns’ Artist Registry Exhibition, curated by Jesse Greenberg, August 1-31, 2018
Conversations in Contemporary Poetics, Hauser & Wirth, May 15, 2018
COMMON VISIONS, The Guesthouse, Cork, Ireland, co-presented by aemi, April 11, 2018
"Hello, You're On Live", Flaherty Seminar New York, co-presented by Electronic Arts Intermix, Anthology Film Archives, New York, NY, March 27, 2018
YES: Victoria Keddie & Scott Kiernan, Microscope Gallery, Brooklyn NY, Feb. 5th, 2018
The Uncertain Archive, Zumzeig Cine, Barcelona, January 30, 2018
New York Eye and Ear Control: Experimental Animation, Harvestworks, New York NY, January 20
Dlectricity, Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, Detroit, September 22-23, 2017
Lifestyle Guru, Pioneer Works, Brooklyn NY, March 26, 2017
Daytime Viewing (Prime Time), Pioneer Works, Brooklyn NY, March 12, 2017
Public Access / Creative Networks, BRIC, Brooklyn NY, March 22-May 7, 2017 Dreamlands: Expanded - Optipus, Whitney Museum of American Art / Microscope Gallery, Brooklyn NY, January 15, 2017
Optics: TV Eye, Roulette, Brooklyn NY, Nov 3, 2016
Cold Open Verse, PS1 Art Book Fair, NYC, Sept. 8-17, 2016
Queens International 2016, Queens Museum, Queens NY, April 10-July 31, 2016
The Trial of Anne Opie Wehrer, by Robert Ashley, 365 Mission, Los Angeles, March 19-20, 2016
Experimental Television Center, ETC..., Hunter College Art Galleries, November 6, 2015
AFTERSOUND: Frequency, Attack, Return, Miller Gallery at Carnegie-Mellon University, Aug 21 -Nov 26, 2015
Sound and Vision Live, Lincoln Center, Oct 29, 2015
PICA : 15, Portland Institute of Contemporary Art, September 13
Consumes Me / Poet Transmit, Recess, NY NY, Sept. 3, 2015
E.S.P. TV, Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, July 27, 2015
E.S.P. TV + Shana Moulton, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, CA, April 16, 2015
E.S.P. TV, Human Resources, April 14, 2015
World Electroacoustic Living Room, California State University, Fullerton, CA; February - March 2015
Whitney Biennial 2014, Whitney Museum of American Art, “Vidas Perfectas”, April 2014
A Light Spray, Portland Museum of Modern Art, Portland, OR; January 7, 2014
Being (the Critical History Project), Storefront for Art and Architecture, Oct. 11, 2013 - Jan 11, 2014
Smashism, Human Resources, Los Angeles, Nov. 2, 2013
Dirty Looks Presents Luther Price, PS1, Queens, NY, Oct. 20, 2013
XFER STATION, New Museum, 235 Bowery, NYC, Sept. 5, 2013
Magic IF, Museum of Arts and Design, NYC, May 11, 2013
The Live Live! Show, Museum of Arts and Design, NYC, April 13, 2013
Public Service Announcement, Museum of Arts and Design, NYC. March 9, 2013 HPSCHD, Eyebeam Center for Arts and Technology, NY, NY, May 3-4, 2013
The White Album, Louis B. James, New York, Jan. 11 - Feb 26, 2013
Alternative Impulses in Art and Action, Franklin Street Works, Stamford CT, October 27, 2012 – January 13, 2013
Where is the Here if the Here is in There?, Pallas Projects/Studios, Dublin, Ireland, September 15, 2012
E.S.P. TV, Queens Nails Annex, San Francisco, CA, June 8, 2012
[Mis] Adventures in Manipulation, Millenium Film Workshop, NYC, August 19- 20, 2011
5C5C: Five Cities Five Curatorial Concepts, Centro Internazionale Per L’Arte Contemporanea (CIAC), Rome 2011
autosemblematic, Local Project, Long Island City, NY, 2010
My Heroes, Jack the Pelican, Brooklyn, NY, 2009
East Meets West, Baer Ridgeway Exhibitions, San Francsico, 2009
Exhibition, 211 Elizabeth St., NYC, 2009
Another Country, Magnes Museum, Berkeley, CA, 2008
The Audacity of Desperation, PS122, NY, NY, 2008
Third Guangzhou Triennial 2008, Guangzhou, China
Selected Songs of the Soft Cigarette, San Francisco Art Institute, 2007
Grounded, Southern Exposure, San Francisco, 2007
GRANTS
2021: Foundation for Contemporay Arts Grant
2015: Franklin Furnace Grant
2014: Wave Farm Media Grant
2014: Augustine Foundation Grant
RESIDENCIES
Institute for Electronic Arts, Alfred University, 2021
Signal Culture, Owego NY: 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019
Pioneer Works, Artist-In-Residence, January - June, 2016
Recess, New York, NY, Oct 1 - Dec 31, 2014
Storefront for Art and Architecture, New York, NY, October 2013- February 2014
Museum of Arts and Design, New York, NY, February 2013- May 2013
EDUCATION
2007, MFA, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, CA
2003, BFA, School of Visual Arts, New York, NY
TEACHING
Adjunct Professor, Rhode Island School of Design, 2020 - present
(Super)station: Experimental TV Studio, Adjunct Professor, Hunter Graduate Integrated Media Arts, Dept. of Film/Video, Sept. 2015 - Present
BOOKS
Upland, by Scott Kiernan and Ethan Miller, 2016, 72 pgs, Hardcover
SELECTED PRESS AND PUBLICATIONS
Stepping Out of The Space: Kit Fitzgerald and Peter Gordon in Conversation with Charles Eppley, Roulette Video Art, March 27, 2018
Tokumitsu, Miya; After #MeToo, It’s Time to Democratize the Art-World’s Workplaces, Frieze, March 19, 2018
Novick, Ilana; The Political, Pornographic, Experimental World of Public Access TV, Hyperallergic, April 27, 2017
Krasinski, Jennifer; Celebrating the Not-Ready-for-Primetime Pioneers of Commercial-Free TV, April 19, 2017
Colucci, Emily; The Revolution Might Still Be Televised, ArtFCity, March 31, 2017
Weiss, Alexandra; E.S.P. TV Turns Pioneer Works Into Its Own Reality Show, Bullett Magazine, March 24, 2017
Moffitt, Evan; Office Drama, Frieze, March 23, 2017
Makarova, Irina; For Six Weeks This Actual Office is Becoming a Reality TV Show, Creators Project, March 03, 2017
Billyou, Mary; Mixed Use: E.S.P. TV's UNIT 11, Brooklyn Rail, March 2017
Chiaverina, John; E.S.P. TV Aims a Lens at the Inner Workings of Work, ARTnews, Feb. 28, 2017
Martin, Olivia, E.S.P. TV is making a Brooklyn office the subject of a live televisual installation, Wallpaper Magazine, Feb. 22, 2017
Pangburn, DJ; Inside the Warped Electronic Art Studio of Scott Kiernan, The Creators Project, May 13, 2016
Tipton, Gemma; Critic’s Pick, “The Future is Self Organized”, Artforum, February 2016
Disser, Nicole, Inside the Weirdest Show on NYC Public Access, I-D Magazine, February 2016
E.S.P. TV, The Third Rail, Issue No. 4, 2014
Connely, Maeve, TV Museum: Contemporary Art and the Age of Television, Univ. of Chicago Press, 2014
Leland, Erin, Robert Ashley at the Whitney Biennial, Bad at Sports, May 23, 2014
E.S.P. TV, Tunica Magazine, Issue 3, 2014
Connely, Maeve, Studio Spaces , Frieze, Issue 155, May 2013
Mason, Rachel, ESP TV -- Transmitting Forward and Backward at the Same Time, Huffington Post, March 27, 2013
Kimball, Whitney, Artists Are On TV, This Time Not For Bravo Money , Art Fag City, August 23, 2012
Larkin, Daniel, Scott Kiernan's Faux Nineties Xeroxes, Hyperallergic, March 9, 2011
Davis, Ben; Art in Flux, ArtNet, April 2008