Celeste Laborde (b. 1977, in Birmingham, Alabama) is a painter and butoh dancer living in Brooklyn, New York. Her work is an exploration of movement and communication — the paintings and performances she creates are extensions of each other. Using imagery of bodies dancing,  her paintings explore the perception of time, intercorporeal communication, and exalt physical, emotional, and spiritual movement. 

Interested in exploring the relationship between painting and live performance, Laborde’s paintings are more than just a documentation of a fleeting physical moment, her paintings are an opportunity for the viewer to look past the body — to look deeper into the person before them in a way that live performance, video, or photography can not. 

Often highly conceptual, her performances often pull inspiration directly from studio arts and/or result in visual works being made as the “next phase” or “next layer” of a project.

Laborde received a BFA from the University of Montevallo and her work can be found in private collections throughout the South East and New York.