Melissa Stern is an American artist and journalist. Her drawing and sculpture have been exhibited in museums, galleries, private and corporate collections throughout the world. Her art reviews and cultural commentary have been featured in '' Hyperallergic'', the Brooklyn-based digital arts publication. She serves as Art Editor for ''Posit'', a journal of literature and art.

Early life and education

Stern was raised in Philadelphia. She resides in New York City and Shokan, New York. She received her

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...

with Honors in Anthropology from

Wesleyan University Wesleyan University ( ) is a private liberal arts university in Middletown, Connecticut. Founded in 1831 as a men's college under the auspices of the Methodist Episcopal Church and with the support of prominent residents of Middletown, the col ...

Work

Stern does both sculpture and drawings, and uses a wide range of materials including encaustic, clay, pastel, and steel. Her

sculptural Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

work includes found objects,

souvenir A souvenir (), memento, keepsake, or token of remembrance is an object a person acquires for the memories the owner associates with it. A souvenir can be any object that can be collected or purchased and transported home by the traveler as a m ...

s, vintage magazines and books as well as fabricated images and sculpture. Stern's work draws from a wide variety of artists, including

Marisol Escobar Marisol Escobar (May 22, 1930 – April 30, 2016), otherwise known simply as Marisol, was a Venezuelan-American sculptor born in Paris, who lived and worked in New York City. She became world-famous in the mid-1960s, but lapsed into relative obsc ...

Max Beckmann Max Carl Friedrich Beckmann (February 12, 1884 – December 27, 1950) was a German painter, draftsman, printmaker, sculptor, and writer. Although he is classified as an Expressionist artist, he rejected both the term and the movement. In the 1920s ...

, and Jean-Michel Basquiat, and is influenced by Pan-African ethnographic objects. Stern's work was featured in a solo show at ''Station Independent Projects'' on New York’s Lower East Side in March 2017. Her multi-media installation project, ''The Talking Cure'', has been touring the U.S. since 2012, featured at the Akron Art Museum,

Real Art Ways Real Art Ways is a non-profit art space established in 1975. Located at 56 Arbor Street in the Parkville neighborhood of Hartford, Connecticut, Real Art Ways exhibits visual art, houses an independent cinema and presents live music, theater, and ...

(Hartford), Redux Contemporary Art Center (Charleston, SC), and the

Weisman Art Museum The Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum is an art museum at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Founded in 1934 as University Gallery, the museum was originally housed in an upper floor of the university's Northrop Auditorium. In 19 ...

(Minneapolis). The work has been featured on

National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...

(NPR) and in

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

and

ArtNews ''ARTnews'' is an American visual-arts magazine, based in New York City. It covers art from ancient to contemporary times. ARTnews is the oldest and most widely distributed art magazine in the world. It has a readership of 180,000 in 124 countr ...

, and was a featured presentation of the

Spoleto Festival The ''Festival dei Due Mondi'' (Festival of the Two Worlds) is an annual summer music and opera festival held each June to early July in Spoleto, Italy, since its founding by composer Gian Carlo Menotti in 1958. It features a vast array of conce ...

in Charleston, South Carolina. The project is currently on exhibit at the

where it will reside until April 2017. Major solo and group exhibitions include the following: ''Cognitive Dissonance'' at the Spartanburg Art Museum in 2016; ''Psyched'' at Central Booking Gallery in 2014; ''Compulsive Narratives'' at the

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and was ...

in 2014; ''New Math – Drawings'' at the Fetherston Gallery in 2011; ''Life During Wartime – Heads'' at the Barbara Archer Gallery in 2011; ''Step Right Up'' at Bahdeebahdu Gallery in 2009; ''Confrontational Ceramics'', curated by Judith Schwartz at the Westchester Arts Council in 2008; ''Forms of Opulence'' at the Allen Gallery in 2007; ''Have a Seat!'' from the Beylerian Collection of Small Chairs at The Museum of Arts & Design in 2007; ''The Inner Child'' at the

Hunterdon Art Museum The Hunterdon Art Museum, previously known as the Hunterdon Art Center and the Hunterdon Museum of Art, is located in a historic stone mill at 7 Lower Center Street in Clinton, New Jersey. It was founded in 1952 when it purchased Dunham's Mill, t ...

in 2007; ''Loose Lips -Drawing'' Exhibition at Zilkha Gallery at

in 2006; ''Birdland'' at David Lusk Gallery in 2006; 3rd World Ceramics Biennale’s ''Ceramics: The Vehicle of Culture, Invitational'' Exhibition in Icheon, Korea in 2005; ''Vacation'' at Spike Gallery in 2003; ''Pulp Fiction'' at Bahdeebahdu Gallery in 2003; ''Back to School'' at The Children’s Museum of the Arts in New York in 2002; and ''Third Grade'' at John Elder Gallery in 2001.

Collections

Stern’s work is included in several private and public collections, including The Museum of Art and Design in NYC, The International Center for Collage,

The Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...

, rare book collection, Arkansas Arts Center, Stavanger Museum in Stavanger, Norway, The Arario Gallery, Seoul, Korea, the Davison Collection at Wesleyan University, and the corporate collections of The Kohler Company,

News Corporation News Corporation (abbreviated News Corp.), also variously known as News Corporation Limited, was an American multinational mass media corporation controlled by media mogul Rupert Murdoch and headquartered at 1211 Avenue of the Americas in New ...

, and

JPMorgan Chase JPMorgan Chase & Co. is an American multinational investment bank and financial services holding company headquartered in New York City and incorporated in Delaware. As of 2022, JPMorgan Chase is the largest bank in the United States, the ...

. Her work has been reviewed in ARTnews,

The Hartford Courant The ''Hartford Courant'' is the largest daily newspaper in the U.S. state of Connecticut, and is considered to be the oldest continuously published newspaper in the United States. A morning newspaper serving most of the state north of New Haven ...

The Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...

, The Memphis Commercial Appeal, and NY Arts. She has been interviewed by Vasari21 and Brainard Carey for Yale University Radio.

Awards

Stern was awarded Artist Residency at the Benyamini Contemporary Ceramics Center Art in Tel Aviv, Israel in 2014; awarded Artist Residency at The Washington Glass School in Washington, DC in 2011; awarded Artist Residency at The Serenbe Institute for Arts, Culture and the Environment, Serenbe GA in 2007; Sponsor’s Award from the R&F Handmade Paint Juried Exhibition in 2001; and the Kohler Foundation Grant for an Artist-in-Residence at the Kohler Company in Sheboygan, WI in 1998 and 2000.

References

External links

* * http://thetalkingcureproject.com * http://speakingintongues.melissa-stern.com * https://positjournal.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Stern, Melissa Living people Wesleyan University alumni Sculptors from New York (state) American women sculptors Mixed-media artists American contemporary artists Assemblage artists American collage artists Women collage artists American ceramists 21st-century American women artists 21st-century ceramists American women ceramists Year of birth missing (living people)