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From the vault — October 2012 — Syd Carpenter on Artblog Radio

The African American Museum of Philadelphia recently opened More Places of Our Own, an exhibition of sculpture artist Syd Carpenter's work celebrating the community-uniting efforts of African American gardeners and farmers in Georgia and South Carolina. We spoke with Carpenter in the fall of 2012 about the project, right after she returned from Georgia. Have a listen!

Syd Carpenter, in her studio
Syd Carpenter, in her studio

Syd Carpenter’s ceramic sculptures are in many museum collections, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Pennsylvania Academy, and the Renwick in Washington, DC. Carpenter’s muscular and biomorphic forms pull together recognizable imagery–chains, fences, flowers, and a series of farms based on small family farms in the South. Considered together, her work is a loose narrative that suggests personal and black history. Syd, who is a Pew Fellow (1992) and Tyler MFA, chairs the Studio Art Department of Swarthmore College. In our podcast, she talks about what fuels her art, and about her experience working with a community in Ghana, and her recent trip to Georgia to visit African American farms.

This episode is edited by Peter Crimmins. The music is by Eric Biondo. The slide show is edited by artblog Intern Alison McMenamin. Thanks to the Knight Foundation for helping us get the ball rolling on this project. Thanks also to J-Lab‘s Enterprise Reporting Fund and William Penn Foundation for additional support and to our partner WHYY NewsWorks for their ongoing support and for sharing artblog radio episodes on the arts & culture page of their community news site NewsWorks.org. You can subscribe to artblog radio on iTunes.

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