Tom Loeser (Fellow, 2012) comes from a family of unicyclists, and that sense of play permeates his furniture. The Wisconsin artist reimagines utilitarian items as works that challenge the ways we interact – with objects and each other. In Scythe by Scythe (2016), he uses the long-handled farm tools to create a bench that forces people to sit apart.

Myra Mimlitsch-Gray (Fellow, 2016) was introduced to metalwork as a teenager, when her parents were building a home and asked her to straighten nails for reuse. As an adult, the upstate New York metalsmith has made her own sophisticated mark on the material. Magnification: Engraving (2017) draws on history; the pizza-size slab of silver takes its inspiration from the engraving details on a silver tankard made some 300 years before.

Since making his first Soundsuit in 1992, Chicago artist Nick Cave (Fellow, 2016) has created dozens of mixed-media works on themes of race, gun violence, and civic responsibility. The latest pieces from his Tondos series layer weather maps from catastrophic storms over brain scans of black children with PTSD caused by gun violence. The rich colors add beauty – and maybe a ray of hope – to the tragic data.

Image Gallery

Philadelphia artist Judith Schaechter (Fellow, 2014) works in stained glass; she concedes that the technique reached its popular peak in the 12th century, but that doesn’t faze her. Her Odalisque (2015) calls on the medium’s history of portraying sacred scenes: As a mournful figure gazes at a field of intricate flowers, light passes through her like a halo illuminating a saint.

Gestures of the natural world captivate Susanne Stephenson (Fellow, 2010). The Michigan ceramist evokes the movement of water, lava, and wind in abstracted shapes and fragmentary images. In Road Decay IV (2017), vivid colors contrast with deep gashes to convey the entropy and renewal of changing landscapes and climates.