Burning in the Eyes of the Maker : Celeste Dupuy-Spencer

This powerful collection of Celeste Dupuy-Spencer’s electrifying paintings, paired with lyrical, incisive text by Nina MacLaughlin, captures the current American moment in all its chaos, contradiction, and complexity

‘Taken together, Celeste’s paintings become essay, epic, and hymn…She drops herself into the American mythology and the multiple, fractured, contradictory feelings and beliefs and events that define it. She shows us what’s here.’ – Nina MacLaughlin

With an unflinching eye and a painterly sensibility rooted in both the classical and the contemporary, acclaimed artist Celeste Dupuy-Spencer created tender yet charged portrayals of American life. Her arresting compositions grapple with memory, identity, politics, and faith through expressive brushwork and deeply personal scenes.

Burning in the Eyes of the Maker is Dupuy-Spencer’s first full-length publication. Spanning the last decade of her career before her passing in 2026, this momentous volume pairs 63 beautifully reproduced paintings, including new and never-before-published artworks, with equally urgent, layered prose by acclaimed author Nina MacLaughlin.

Taking the paintings as a jumping-off point, MacLaughlin creates narrative impressions of the often riotous scenes depicted. She guides readers inside the thoughts of the figures on the canvas, through the histories of the rooms they occupy, and into Celeste’s mind, past, and creative ethos. A plethora of luscious, full-page details bring the intricacies of these canvases to life.

Equal parts visual archive and literary meditation, Burning in the Eyes of the Maker is an emotionally resonant, uncompromising look at our contemporary moment.