About

Duncan Richards (she/they) is an interdisciplinary artist, social worker, and folk practitioner whose work blurs the boundary between the material and the mystical. Through sculptural assemblage, collage, and spirit work, she conjures vivid imagery that explores the realms of both the seen and the unseen. Her practice is rooted in pre-colonial ways of being, legacies of activism, and traditional folk magic—creating work that dares to reach beyond the edges of imagination.

Drawing from surrealist and animist perspectives, Duncan creates visually meditative pieces that resonate like portals—inviting viewers into spaces where ancestral memory, esoteric tradition, and technological embrace intertwine. Her art becomes a site of communion, where the liminal is honored and the future is summoned.

Duncan’s work has been featured in prominent galleries across Brooklyn and in collaborations with the Kolaj Institute in New Orleans and the National Folklore Collection at the University of Dublin. Across all her projects, she crafts a world where art is not just an object, but an invocation—where spirit and matter speak through one another in a continuous, evolving dialogue.

Artist’s Statement 

My work is as varied as I am. It is an expression of years of interdisciplinary study of spiritual and artistic traditions that have shaped the way I interact with the world. From Trans/Queer lineages of resistance to diasporic practices of divination and folk healing. I collaborate with the unseen as much as with the materials in my studio. The resulting works often feel like artifacts from another time—both ancient and speculative, sacred and futuristic.For me, art is an alchemical process in the same way that magic is. In an era marked by rapid technological transformation and spiritual disconnection, I see my art as a bridge—an invocation of deep remembering and visionary becoming. I invite viewers into these liminal realms, not just to observe but to feel, to commune, and to experience the beauty of the seen and unseen.