One of the first things that Kate Warren G’24 did when she took over the CNY Pride Parade and Festival was to figure out how to sustain excellence. And then try to improve on it.
“CNY Pride was already doing great work,” recalls the self-styled photographic artist, who has co-led festivities with Carin Wolfe G’17, G’18 since 2021. “We just shifted the parade lineup from a logistical exercise to a festive block party.”
Kate Warren G’24 at the CNY Pride Parade and Festival, which she co-directs. “It’s a call to action,” says the acclaimed photographer who teaches at Syracuse University. (Photo by Andrea Kennedy)
No small feat to be sure. Converting the 40-year-old parade’s staging lot into a vibrant street party is a labor of love for Warren. A point of pride, so to speak. Among her and Wolfe’s many responsibilities are vendor recruitment, programming, logistics and operations.
The duo also is part of an intrepid team of volunteers, including CNY Pride’s board of directors, that provides year-round programming, advocacy and support to the area’s LGBTQIA+ community.
“CNY Pride reflects our perseverance and resilience,” says Warren, noting the “juxtaposition of identities” in New York’s Rust Belt Region, including a particularly large working-class queer community.
For this reason, Warren considers the CNY Pride Parade and Festival a “call to action.” “I want to help create a safer, more welcoming world for everyone,” she adds.
Warren’s work has appeared in The New York Times, The New Yorker, Elle, Harper’s Bazaar and Vanity Fair.
A Palpable Influence
“I knew a lot about color theory, texture and visual balance before I entered middle school,” says Warren, who grew up in rural Vermont.
Syracuse—the city and the university—is like a second home to Warren, who resides in New York’s Hudson Valley. She commutes to campus weekly to teach photography in the College of Visual and Performing Arts (VPA) and the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications.
It was Warren’s desire to teach that compelled her to apply for VPA’s M.F.A. program in art photography. Honing her classroom skills while working alongside such prominent professors as Doug DuBois, Laura Heyman and Susannah Sayler was a dream come true.
“Kate was an enthusiastic and motivated teaching assistant, always brimming with ideas and passion,” DuBois recalls. He credits the success of this year’s graduating class of B.F.A. art photography majors, in part, to her “palpable influence and enthusiasm.”
Warren takes the praise in stride, insisting that teaching is a reciprocal process—a two-way street where students should be treated as “future colleagues.”
“On the first day of class, I tell my students that I’m here to give them knowledge, information and support—tools they can use regardless of their career path,” says the VPA part-time instructor, whose impactful photography has appeared in The New York Times, The New Yorker, Elle, Harper’s Bazaar and Vanity Fair. “Teaching is an extension of my personal values.”
Warren discovered photography’s “linguistic possibilities” while studying abroad. “That’s when I realized art could unite people in unique ways,” she says.
A Keen Eye for Beauty
Born and raised in rural Vermont, Warren came from a conservative Catholic background. She acknowledges the “trauma and challenges” of growing up queer in such an environment. “The Church’s stance on LGBTQIA+ people was traumatic and directly contributed to my closeting,” admits Warren, who didn’t come out until her mid-thirties.
At the same time, Catholicism instilled in Warren values like compassion and empathy, which have since spilled over into her work as an artist, teacher and community organizer.
She also fell in love with the Church’s sense of occasion—the tapestry of words, actions and music that defines public worship. “I love me a full-chorus number,” she quips.
Meanwhile, Warren’s mother introduced Kate to the reflective nature of quilting; her father, to the imaginative world of photography. And with Vermont’s lush countryside as her personal playground, she developed a keen eye for natural beauty.
“Those experiences shaped my aesthetic language,” says Warren, who also is trained in dance, fiber arts and ceramics.
Drawn to the social aspects of creativity, Warren didn’t seriously pursue photography until high school.
That didn’t stop her from eventually studying abroad in Barcelona, Spain, where, as a marketing major at Marist University, she discovered photography’s linguistic qualities.
“I didn’t speak the language, so I communicated with strangers through my camera,” Warren remembers. “That’s when I realized art could unite people in unique ways.”
Intimacy, memory and grief are common themes of Warren’s work.
A Trust-Based Connection
After graduation, Warren found herself in Washington, D.C., apprenticing with a well-known photographer. She quickly learned the ropes of running a small business and, in time, was competing against him for the same jobs.
Work followed, along with recognition from the Lucie Foundation, the British Journal of Photography, American Photography and the Athens Photo Festival.
Warren’s recent move to the City of Hudson, a burgeoning arts hub about two hours north of New York City, has pushed her career in new directions. These days, she’s an in-demand editorial and commercial photographer who collaborates exclusively with “value-aligned clients.” “I’m also working on my first book,” she says excitedly.
When she’s not serving on the board of OUT Hudson, Warren can be found running Golden Kin, an “inspiring and restorative space” for LGBTQIA+ artists and those of color. She also is the editorial and community outreach director for Toolshed, a Hudson-based nonprofit that shares tools for ecological living.
As an artist, Warren leans into life’s sharp edges, using “vulnerability as a catalyst for connection.” Intimacy, memory and grief are common themes of her work.
“My art centers on trust-based connection, with the primary output being how I make the person I’m photographing feel,” says Warren, whose process is imbued with collaboration, consent and care. “It can be incredibly healing to be seen in such an intimate way. The image is secondary; it’s proof of our mutual bond.”
