Kelly Joy Ladd

Kelly Joy Ladd is a visual artist based in Orlando, Florida. Her work explores art as a carrier of energy, transmitting intention, love, and memory through material form. She creates three-dimensional paper and mixed media relief sculptures and uses spiritual energies (love, joy, wonder, kindness, compassion, gratitude, and peace) as artistic mediums. She also incorporates water and soil collected from meaningful places, including Wekiva Springs, where memory and energy are held within the elements themselves. Her practice draws on studies in physics, astronomy, and Eastern philosophy, and is in dialogue with the work of Hilma af Klint, Emma Kunz, Agnes Pelton, and Ana Mendieta.

Ladd was a finalist for the 2025 Florida Prize in Contemporary Art at the Orlando Museum of Art. She is a 2026 Halo Arts Fellow and received a 2024-25 and 2026-27 Individual Artist Grant from United Arts of Central Florida. Her work has been exhibited at the Mint Museum, the DeLand Museum of Art, and the Mennello Museum of American Art, and is held in hospital collections.

Ladd is the founder of Artists on Couches, a long-term conceptual art project she has documented daily since 2022. Through a digital archive on Instagram (@artistsoncouches), she invites visual artists from around the world to explore and share the mysteries behind their work, including intuition, inspiration, flow, the creative process, the source of ideas, and the experience of creation itself. The project takes shape through collective energy, shared experience, and exchange.