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During Kathleen Greco's career she worked with plastics as a product designer and as a three dimensional illustrative medium for magazines and advertising agencies. Years later while writing her Yummy Yarns book, using her industrial design background, she formulated the idea of a waterproof, glossy round textile into a vinyl yarn product called Jelly Yarns®. The colorful brand includes 12 transparent, translucent, neon colors flexible for contemporary textile arts including weaving, knitting, crocheting, and sculpture. Bright, delicious neon, glow-in-the-dark, black light colors are named after candies and sweets.
The concept of a "clear" waterproof yarn broadened the material application and definition of traditional fiber yarns. Clear Jelly Yarn® does not absorb light, allowing light to pass through without boundaries. The objects or textiles created in the clear yarn provide clarity in the surrounding space and wearer to be seen.
Maison Margiela Paris under the direction of Glen Martens, known for his deconstructed conceptual approach to design, featured "Look 13" a jacket knit with Clear Jelly Yarn®, worn by model Calum Harper for their Spring / Summer 2026, Co-Ed Ready-To-Wear show.
Minimalist in concept, I am a visual artist informed by our living history exploring the human experience often exposing social undercurrents. My interdisciplinary studio practice comprises contemporary works on paper, paintings, photography and sculpture. Applying knowledge from my industrial design background, I pair relationships of metamorphic materials and transformative techniques letting them dictate the investigation including, graphite, charcoal, wax pastels, and flower petals.
Driven by discovery and process, I let the materials guide the outcome of my body of work. Not limiting myself to one medium, I select materials and methods that conceptually and physically respond to the ideas I am exploring guiding the outcome of my body of work. Choreographing relationships, conditions, and materials to engage and inform, similar to changes we experience in life, my work investigates themes of fragility, resilience, memory, and transition suggesting a bigger materiality lies underneath and within the surfaces.
My influences include painter Mark Rothko, "a painting is an expression of the artist's notion of reality… not a rendering of a particular thing."
Kathleen Greco is a conceptual visual artist. Greco received her MFA in Studio Arts from the University of the Arts, Philadelphia and a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Design from the Philadelphia College of Art. Greco's artwork has been exhibited in museums and galleries including the Museum of Art and Design New York, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C., Hayward Gallery, England UK, Woodmere Art Museum, Pennsylvania, Elisabet Ney Museum, Texas, Museum Frieder Burda, Baden-Baden, Germany, and Schlossmuseum, Linz, Austria. Her sculpture was included in the collaborative Coral Reef Pod World's installation in the Central Pavilion at the Venice Biennale 2019, Venice, Italy and was exhibited in Getty’s PST ART: Art and Science Collide Exhibition 2025.
Greco's art is included in private and public collections.
2015
University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
MFA Studio Arts
1979
University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
BS Industrial Design
2012
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Cast Drawing, Anatomy, Life Drawing
2023
Harry Harris Prize, Woodmere Art Museum 81st Annual Exhibition, Philadelphia, PA
2021
18th Annual Betsy Meyer Memorial Exhibition and Meyer Family Award for Contemporary Art, Mainline Art Center, Haverford, PA
2019
Artist Residency, Civita Institute, Civita di Bagnoregio, Italy
2016
President's Award, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
2015 - 2013
Provost Fellowship Award, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
2015 - 2013
MFA Scholarship, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
2015
The Richard and Patricia Henkels Award, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
2014
Faculty Award, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
2013-2012
Continuing Education Scholarship Award, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA
2017
Mercer County Community College, West Windsor, NJ
Assistant Professor, Digital Photography
2021
Studio Arts Graduate Department, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Visiting Artist Lecture
2012
Lafayette College, Easton, PA
Visiting Artist Lecture
Illustration Department, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Visiting Artist Lecture
1999
Royal College of Arts, London, England
Visiting Artist Lecture
AIGA Graphix Conference, Jacob Javits Convention Center, New York, NY
Lecture
Garbe, Sharon, Local innovation and tradition in the Woodmere Art Museum’s 81st Annual Juried Exhibition, Artblog, July 2023
Stola Contemporary Art, Democracy In Danger, Stola Contemporary Publisher, July 2022
Kittelmann, Udo, Value and Transformation of Corals: Catalogue for the exhibition at Museum FriederBurda 2022, Wienand Verlag Publisher, August 2022
Jenkins, Mark, In My Head, In My Body, The Washington Post, December 2020
Jenkins, Mark, In the galleries: Unfinished Works at Target Gallery, The Washington Post, January 2018
Civita Institute, Civita di Bagnoregio, Italy
The Institute for Figuring, Los Angeles, CA
University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
2025
On the Land, In the Sea, InLiquid at Courtyard by Marriott Philadelphia South at The Navy Yard, Philadelphia, PA
Small Works To-Go, Abington Art Center, Abington, PA
Architecture in Abstraction, Box Spring Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
Architecture in Abstraction is also participating in the 20/20 Photo Festival
#31: Indirect Address, White Columns, New York, NY
Curator: Katharina McCarty
Seeing the Unseeable: Data, Design, Art, The Institute For Figuring Pod Worlds, Getty’s PST ART: Art and Science Collide Exhibition, Art Center College of Design, Alyce de Roulet Williamson Gallery, Pasadena, CA
Coral Seas and Other Attractions, A Collaborative Project by Christine and Margaret Wertheim and the Institute for Figuring Inspired by Mathematics and Climate Change, Schloss Museum, Linz, Austria
2024
Voice of the People, InLiquid Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
New Now VII, InLiquid Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
InLiquid Toasts 25, Off the Wall Gallery at Dirty Franks, Philadelphia, PA
The Naked Show, InLiquid Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
2023
The Woodmere Annual: 81st Juried Exhibition, Woodmere Art Museum, Philadelphia, PA
Juror: Doug Bucci, artist
Paper Works, Site Brooklyn Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Juror: Julia Halpern, Executive Editor ArtNet
Roe 2.0, Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, IL
2022
Value and Formation of Corals, Museum Frieder Burda, Baden-Baden, Germany Invitational
Democracy In Danger, Stola Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL
Uncommon Prints x Common Matrices, Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, IL
Believe In Tomorrow Outdoor Garden Sculpture Exhibition, Mainline Art Center, Haverford, PA
My Body / My Choice, AIR Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
2021
REEMERGENCE: 18th Annual Betsy Meyer Memorial Award Exhibition, Mainline Art Center, Haverford, PA
Fresh 2021, SoLA Contemporary, Los Angeles, CA
The New Normal, Payne Gallery, Bethlehem, PA
UNDEFEATED: Canvas(s)ing the Politics of Voter Suppression Since Women’s Suffrage, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV
2020
Suffrage Now, Elisabet Ney Museum, Austin, TX
Right To Vote, Hera Gallery, Wakefield, RI
In My Head In My Body, Target Gallery, Alexandria, VA
Conversations 2020, Puffin Cultural Forum, Teaneck, NJ
UNITI: Separate but United, Civita Institute, Seattle, WA
2019
May You Live in Interesting Times, Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy Invitational
Artwork part of the collaborative
Crochet Coral Reef Project, produced by artists Christine and Margaret Wertheim Crochet Coral Reef, Lehigh University Art Gallery, Lehigh, PA
Invitational
Shame, Hera Gallery, Wakefield, RI
2018
Patterns, La Bodega Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Under the Surface, 440 Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Black + White, Site: Brooklyn Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Juror: Rosario Güiraldes, Assistant Curator at the Drawing Center New York
2017
Interlude: Unfinished Works, Target Gallery, VA
Juror: Betsy Johnson, Assistant Curator at the Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC
MFA National Exhibition, First Street Gallery, New York, NY
Juror: Dorothea Rockburne, artist
Feminist Opposition, Hera Gallery, Wakefield, RI
The Personal Is Political Feminist Exhibition, Art Rise Gallery, Savannah, GA
2016
Peace Among the Savages AKA The Gun Show, Amos Eno Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Obscure, President's Gallery University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Two Person Exhibition Invitational
12th National Exhibition, Ceres Gallery, New York, NY
Juror: Carmen del Valle Hermo Assistant Curator, Collections Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
2016
Icebreaker 7, Ice Gallery, Denver, CO
2015
MFA Biennial, Delaware Center for the Contemporary Art, Wilmington, DE
Old Enough To Know Better, Crane Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Curator: Eileen Neff, artist
Art Unleashed, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Coral Reef, New York University Abu Dhabi, Dhabi, UAE Invitational
The Five Obstructions, Crane Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Invitational
2012
Bound, Phoenix Gallery, New York, NY Curator: Associate Curator Cora Rosevear, Museum of Modern Art
Sticks, Hooks and the Mobius, Williamson Gallery, Lafayette College, Easton, PA
Invitational
2011
Photography as Art and Photographer as Artist, Phillips Mill Gallery, New Hope, PA
Reefs, Rubbish and Reason, Art Center College of Design, Williamson Gallery, Pasadena, CA
Invitational
Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C.
Invitational
2010
Toxic Reef, Science Gallery, Dublin, Ireland Invitational 2009 Coral Reef, Track 16, Los Angeles, CA Invitational 2008 Hyperbolic Coral Reef, The Hayward Gallery, London, England UK
Invitational
2009
Coral Reef, Track 16, Los Angeles, CA Invitational
2008
Hyperbolic Coral Reef, The Hayward Gallery, London, England UK Invitational
