Chelsea Thompto
- she/her
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Education
2019 MFA, 4D Art, University of Wisconsin Madison, WI
2019 MA, Gender and Women’s Studies, University of Wisconsin Madison, WI
2018 MA, 4D Art, University of Wisconsin Madison, WI
2016 MA, Sculpture, Sacramento State University, CA
2012 BFA, Sculpture, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA
2012 K-12 Art Education Licensure Program, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA
Chelsea Thompto a transdisciplinary artist working at the intersections of art, trans studies, and technology. Her research based studio practice spans a variety of media which often include code, video, sound, writing, books, and sculpture, and is focused on political, bureaucratic, and technological systems used to visualize and categorize (trans) bodies and the violences they produce and reproduce. Born and raised in Iowa, she received a B.F.A. in Sculpture from the University of Iowa, and M.F.A. in 4D Art and M.A. in Gender and Women’s Studies both from the University of Wisconsin Madison. A recent transplant to Virginia, she has spent most of her life between the Midwest and California. Currently, her work is interested in the politics of visibility/respectability, fog, trans futures, and horror.
Art and Technology, Creative Coding, Trans Studies, Text and Image, Artist Books/Websites.
ART 1214: Principles of 3D Art & Design
ART 2434 / 3114 / 5714: Intro to Creative Code
ART 3604: Web 3D
ART 4804/5854: New Media Art Theory
ART 4894: Senior Studio
ART 5534: Grad Critique
ART 5524: MFA Studio
Selected Exhibitions/Screenings:
Debox”, The Wrong Biennale, online. 2025/2026 (Group Exhibition)
“Queer Multiples”, Art Metropole, Toronto, ON, Canada. 2025 (Group Exhibition)
“Fictions of Presence”, / (slash), San Francisco, CA. 2024 (Group Exhibition)
“Creative Minds”, San José Museum of Art, San José, CA.2024 (Performance)
“Net art died but is doing well”, The Wrong Biennale 2023/24, Online. 2023. (Group Exhibition)
“NEW INC Art & Code Showcase”, Dunkunsthalle, New York, NY. 2023. (Group Exhibition)
“Performing Media Festival”, Langlab South Bend, South Bend, IN. 2022. (Group Screening)
“Over Again”, Padnos Gallery, Allendale, MI. 2021. (Group Exhibition)
“Productive Bodies”, The Neon Heater Gallery, Findlay, OH. 2020. (Solo Exhibition)
Museum Commissions:
The Fog, Interactive website, hand-coded in HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. San José Museum of Art, San José, CA and Online. 2023
Selected Publications:
“Teaching Sustainable Creative Technologies”, 1st International Workshop on Low Carbon Computing (LOCO 2024), arXiv, 2025.
“Untitled (Fog Pill)”, Transgender Studies Quarterly, 2025.
“Trans Allyship in Academia Today” Inside Higher Ed., 2025.
“A Hacked Manifesto”, e-flux Journal Issue 146, 2024.
Contributor to “Trans Hirstory in 99 Objects” edited by David Evans Frantz, Christina Linden, & Chris E. Vargas, 2024.
“Trans (In)Visibility in Art,” Transgender Studies Quarterly, 2022.
“Building a More Sustainable and Accessible Internet: Lightweight Web Design with HTML and CSS,” SJSU ScholarWorks, 2022.
“Alternatives to Facebook: Taking the 'Big' out of 'Big Tech'.”(Co-Authored with Étienne Brown) Newsweek. March 7, 2022.
Selected Residencies/Fellowships/Incubators:
Artist Residency - Art X (University of Galway and Burren College of Art), Galway, Ireland. 2024.
NEW INC Incubator Member, Art and Code Track Year 9, New York, NY. 2022.
Public Voices Fellowship, SJSU OpEd Project, San José, CA. 2021.
Laboratory Residency, Winter 2021 Digital Residency, Spokane, WA. 2021.
Signal Culture, Toolmaker In Residence Summer/Fall 2019, Oswego, NY. 2019.
Selected Grants and Awards:
AAD Certificate for Excellence in Teaching - Virginia Tech College of Architecture, Arts, and Design, Blacksburg VA. 2025
Faculty Initiated Research Grant (FIRG) - Virginia Tech College of Architecture, Arts, and Design, Blacksburg VA. 2024.
Sustainable Futures Curriculum Community Initiative Award San José State University, San José CA. 2021.