Keisha Prioleau-Martin

Recenter

January 3 — February 8, 2025

New York City: 41 Orchard Street, Upper Level

Olympia is pleased to present Recenter, a solo exhibition of new paintings and ceramics by Keisha Prioleau-Martin. This is her second solo exhibition with the gallery.

Prioleau-Martin’s autobiographical engagement with portraiture coalesce through a dialogue between painting and sculpture. The two mediums create a fluid, internal game of telephone, where introspection, retrospection, and immediacy intertwine and transform one another.

For the first time, through real and imagined compositions, Prioleau-Martin places herself at the center of her work. Across the exhibition, the artist is seen reading in bed, blissfully tangled with her partner, laughing hysterically in solitude, or envisioned as an overtly feminine sitter. Card games, lush and contained floral elements, and the artist’s own cat enrich these scenes. Depicting quiet, intimate memories and aspirational gestures, Prioleau-Martin emphasizes that acts of exchange have the capacity to nourish and empower.

Prioleau-Martin’s studio is located in the historic Boys' Club building on 10th Street and Avenue A in New York City, a space steeped in community legacy. The building is set for a major renovation, though the timeline remains uncertain. Operated by the Joyce Theater Foundation, it is constantly filled with dance rehearsals and performances, imbuing Prioleau-Martin’s studio with a palpable atmosphere of movement and transience. This environment, rich in chosen family and community, reflects values that have always been central to Prioleau-Martin’s practice.

Through Recenter, Prioleau-Martin urges us to hold onto the people and things that shape us and, perhaps most profoundly, to take nothing for granted.

Keisha Prioleau-Martin’s work delves into the warmth and harmony of community, drawing on memories of joy and humor to explore deeper layers of consciousness. Through a practice that merges painting and sculpture, Prioleau-Martin allows the two mediums to inform and shape one another. Each piece begins with memory—whether real or imagined—and celebrates values such as beauty, romantic and platonic connection, and the grounding strength of solitude.

Keisha Prioleau-Martin earned her BFA from SUNY Purchase (2017). She has had solo exhibitions at Olympia (New York, NY, 2025, 2022); ArtShack (New York, NY, 2022); and the former Art of Our Century (New York, NY, 2020). Selected group exhibitions include DC Moore (New York, NY, 2023); Contemporary Art Now (Ibiza, Spain, 2023); Dinner Gallery (New York, NY, 2021); and Zurcher (New York, NY, 2020).

Her work has been featured in Artnet, Hyperallergic, Art Spiel, and The Coastal Post.