Marketing & Communications: SAIC Artists Named United States Artists (USA) Distinguished Fellows

Chicago—SAIC faculty member Anne Wilson was named a United States Artists (USA) Distinguished Fellow. Each year, USA celebrates the breadth of American artistic practices by providing $50,000 unrestricted awards directly to artists. Former faculty member and SAIC alum Deborah Stratman (BFA 1990), a Chicago-based artist and filmmaker, was also named a fellow.

“We are thrilled to see our talented faculty and alumni recognized for their diverse artistic practices,” says Lisa Wainwright, SAIC’s Dean of Faculty and Vice President of Academic Affairs. “Professional practice is a crucial component to teaching at SAIC, and the work of Anne Wilson and Deborah Stratman, which weaves together the larger social systems around labor and private notions of creative wonder, are ideal models for young artists and designers.”

Wilson creates sculpture, drawings, performances and video animations that explore themes of time, loss, private and social rituals. Her use of everyday materials, such as table linen, bed sheets, human hair, lace, thread, glass and wire, embrace conceptual strategies and handwork.

"I am grateful and deeply honored to be recognized as one of the 2015 United States Artists Distinguished Fellows,” Wilson says. “This award will allow me to take risks with the production of new work and to continue exploring the interdisciplinary intersections between art, craft and design."

Wilson's art is in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Art Institute of Chicago; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Detroit Institute of Arts; Museum of Glass, Tacoma; Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester; and the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art in Kanazawa, Japan, among others. She has received awards fro the Driehaus Foundation, Artadia, Tiffany Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, and the Illinois Arts Council.

Stratman’s works revolve around the relationships between physical environments and human struggles for power and control that play out on the land. She has exhibited internationally at venues including MoMA NY, Centre Pompidou, Hammer Museum, Mercer Union, Witte de With, the Whitney Biennial and festivals including Sundance, Viennale, CPH/DOX, Oberhausen, Ann Arbor, Full Frame and Rotterdam. Stratman is the recipient of Fulbright and Guggenheim fellowships, a Creative Capital grant and an Alpert Award. She teaches at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Photo: To Cross (Walking New York), performance at The Drawing Center, 2014
Courtesy of the artist and Rhona Hoffman Gallery