Ann Hamilton Becomes Member of American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Ohio born Ann Hamilton, professor in the Department of Art and internationally known visual artist, was inducted into the prestigious American Academy of Arts and Sciences in Cambridge Massachusetts on October 10

Founded during the American Revolution, the Academy has been in existence for over 225 years. Today the Academy annually selects individuals who represent pioneering research and scholarship, artistic achievement, and exemplary service to society. It also conducts a varied program of projects and studies responsive to the needs and problems of society.

A past recipient of MacArthur and Guggenheim Fellowships, Hamilton is best known for her large scale, materially diverse installations that respond to architectural sites and their context. The environments she creates are "sensory explorations of time, language, and memory."

Her work has been widely exhibited in America and abroad. Her public sculpture projects include permanent commissions in collaboration with landscape architect Michael Van Valkenburgh and artist Michael Mercil (also a faculty member in the Department of Art) for Allegheny River Park in Pittsburgh and Teardrop Park in Battery Park City, in New York, NY. Her public commissions also include permanent works for the Seattle Central Library and the San Francisco Public Library, among many others.

In September 2008, she was honored with the 14th Annual Heinz Award in the Arts and Humanities for a body of work that has established her as "one of contemporary art's most influential voices." Last January, Hamilton installed human carriage in the rotunda of the Guggenheim Museum in New York as part of an exhibition, "The Third Mind: American Artists Contemplate, Asia 1860-1989." The exhibition illuminated the dynamic and complex impact of Asian art, literature, music, and philosophical concepts on American art.

Ohio State will have an Ann Hamilton work in its public art collection. In 2008, Hamilton was selected by the university-wide Campus Art and Memorials Committee to create a permanent art installation for the renovated William Oxley Thompson Memorial Library, which re-opened on August 3. The commission is funded through the State of Ohio's "Percent for Art" program.