Through reclaiming natural and mundane found materials and images, Kern creates sculptural assemblages that honor ineffable experiences. Disparate parts are poetically sealed together, referencing stained glass, x-rayed bodies, cosmological charts and quilts–narrative structures in which emotion, symbology, mysticism, tragedy, and transcendence echo. The works act as reliquaries and wayfinders through varying states of degradation, preserving an affinity for life even in its fleeting form.
Lydia has been an artist-in-residence at the Corporation of Yaddo, Champlain College, Vermont Studio Center, the Lab Program in Mexico City, and AS220. She received the Diane Gabriel Award in 2024 and in 2025 installed a permanent public sculpture “Anthology” in Burlington, VT. Recent solo exhibitions include Torch Songs at the McCarthy Gallery at Saint Michael’s College in 2025 (VT) and Passages at Epsilon Spires in 2022 (VT), as well as many group exhibitions in the Northeast. Lydia earned her bachelors of social work and BA in studio art from the University of Vermont in 2015. Originally from Massachusetts and Burlington, Vermont, she lives and works in Queens, New York.