Joan Snyder

b. 1940

BiographyJoan Snyder (b. 1940) is a renowned American artist whose abstract compositions are inspired by poetry, nature, and daily life. Born on April 16, 1940 in Highland Park, NJ, Snyder received a BA from Douglass College (1962) and an MFA from Rutgers University (1966). In the early 1970s, she embarked on her most famous series of work entitled “Stroke” paintings. Comprising gestural abstractions, these works are widely regarded as a counterpoint to the male-dominated Minimalist genre of the time. Each brush-stroke formation conveys Snyder’s life and experiences in rich color and dynamic composition.
In addition to her prolific output of works on canvas, Snyder is also known for her longstanding and active engagement with print-making. Created over the course of nearly 50 years, Snyder’s prints trace the evolution of her oeuvre and reveal her experimental approach to the medium.
In 1972, Snyder was commissioned by the American Dance Festival in New London, Connecticut to contribute a piece. The work she produced, entitled Screams/Whispers, was subsequently configured into a larger screen print that reflects the exuberant approach of her gestural stroke paintings from the same period. The proposed gift represents #51/144 from this edition.
Snyder founded the Mary H. Dana Women Artist Series in 1971, an organization which continues to champion the work of emerging and established female artists. Her accolades include a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in 1974, a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship in 1983, a MacArthur Fellowship in 2007, and Arts & Letters Award in Art from the American Academy of Arts & Letters (2016). Snyder currently resides in Brooklyn and Woodstock, New York.

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