Sonya Clark

Sonya Clark is a professor and the chair of Craft/ Material Studies in the School of Fine Arts at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia. She is known for using a variety of materials including human hair and combs in multi-sensorial ways to address race, culture, class, and history. She has an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art and was honored with the school’s first Distinguished Mid-Career Alumni Award. She received a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and also holds BA from Amherst College. Her informal education comes from her Jamaican grandmother, who was a professional tailor, and the many traditional artists she has met during her international travels. She is the recipient of several awards, including a United States Artists Fellowship, Art Prize, and a Pollock-Krasner Grant. Her work has been exhibited in more than three hundred museums and galleries in Africa, Australia, Europe, Asia, and the Americas.