Kristín Helga Ríkharðsdóttir earned her BA in Fine Art from the Iceland University of the Arts in 2016 and completed her MFA in Fine Art at New York University Steinhardt in January 2022. During her studies at IUA, she participated in an exchange program at Universität der Künste in Berlin, and later returned to Berlin for an internship in 2017.

Since graduating, Kristín has actively exhibited her work both in Iceland and internationally. Her video pieces have received awards at film festivals, and in 2019, a music video she directed was nominated for the Icelandic Music Awards.

She has also contributed to the Icelandic art community through various organizational roles. From 2018 to 2020, she served on the board of The Living Art Museum as an alternate member, co-curated the Calm and Romantic exhibition series at Harbinger in 2019, and has been a member of the Kling & Bang artist collective since 2020.

Kristín developed much of her exhibition Data Craters during a residency at ISCP in New York in the summer of 2024. The series draws viewers into a vibrant digital realm filled with neon hues and tectonic shifts.

*"To create the paintings, I use 3D software to generate images that are then digitally woven and stretched onto frames. I add dimension with acrylic resin paint, as well as found textiles and objects.

I began this series in 2021 while pursuing my MFA in New York, around the same time a volcanic eruption started on the Reykjanes Peninsula. I became fascinated with watching the eruption through livestreams and news footage. When I finally saw it in person, I witnessed vivid, neon-colored lava plumes bursting from the earth, forming a new mountain. That surreal experience inspired this body of work.

The eruption reminded me of digital spaces—worlds of constant creation and destruction, much like lava flows that reshape the landscape.

Since then, I’ve continued working on the series off and on, as eruptions have become a near-constant part of Icelandic life. The imagery incorporates iStock photos, mathematical symbols, lottery balls, references to traditional landscape painting, and visual multiplicity. Small human figures often appear, gazing at the eruption in awe—as if the volcano represents both creation and annihilation."*