Michele Wood

Biography

Artist, Educator, Illustrator, Speaker, Designer, Writer and Mentor, Michele Wood (b.1964) is best known for depicting moments in African American history as well as changing consciousness of the African American experience. With a career spanning over 30 years, this prolific artist continues to document the human experience with an unusually poetic introspection on African American history.

Michele Wood is the recipient of over 30 awards and honors. Michele was awarded the Ashley Bryan Illustrator Children Book Award in 2012. Her Art quilt was chosen for Glory Kilanko’s Video at the National Center for Civil and Human Rights in 2012. The release of I Lay My Stitches Down, text by Cynthia Grady, won the 2013 Gold Nautilus award, 2012 recipient of the NYPL Children’s Book List and more.

Michele’s art has been exhibited in museums and galleries in the USA. Her art is included in private art collections the Indiana State Museum, Tubman Museum and more. A native of Indianapolis, Indiana, the amazing story of Michele’s rise as an artist began with her graduation in 1991 from the American College for Applied Arts- last named American Intercontinental University in Atlanta, Georgia under Steve Steinman. In 1994, the Apex Museum awarded the artist with a grant that allowed her to embark upon a pilgrimage to Yoruba Land in Africa. She was mentored by the international acclaimed sculpture Lamidi Olande Fakaye. It gave Michele an appreciation for aesthetics and led to her first publication Going Back Home: An Artist Return to the South (1996), a book that
explores her family’s rural Southern heritage. Wood drew inspiration from her African heritage, Southern African-American roots, American quilts, African textiles and everyday experiences.

The public began to take increasing note of Michele’s evolving talents when, in 1993 and 1994, she produced the coveted Atlanta Jazz Series Poster. The posters instantly elevated her work to the status of highly-valued collectibles. In 1995, the Tubman Museum in Macon, Georgia organized a solo exhibition. In 1996, Michele Wood’s artwork was selected for Fulton County Art Commission public art at the Atlanta Airport. Since that time, this first hint at future achievements has been confirmed through the acquisition and commission of her work by such organizations as: the Toni Morrison Society, Fulton County Arts Commission for the Auburn Avenue Senior Citizens Home, Black Entertainment Network, St. Jude Christian Church in Atlanta, 1997 Playbill and Poster Arizona Theatre Company, Tubman Museum and Indiana State Museum.

Often painting from the American experience in her chosen medium Acrylic, she is known for her detailed quilted pattern motif works, Michele’s work continually evolved over the years, and in 1996, Wood’s first children’s book Going Back Home: An Artist Returns to the South marked a turning point in her career. It established her not only as a major modern artist but as an important commentator on the history and culture of African-American people. She received for her efforts the highly-prized American Book Award as well as nearly universal critical acclaim.

The artist followed the success of Going Back Home with her contribution to Just Like Me, an anthology of visual self-portraits and autobiographical writings by fourteen artists from different cultural backgrounds. In 1998, she returned with I See the Rhythm. Critics applauded the book for “Mixing modernist and primitive styles and using color nicely to communicate musical style and tone.” They also noted, “the pictures broadcast joy, innovation, and exuberance in the face of systematic oppression.” The American Library Association awarded Michele with the 1999 Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award for the illustrations. She chartered new gro