ABOUT TFA FELLOWS

Touchstone Gallery and Touchstone Foundation for the Arts are thrilled to announce the 2023-2024 Touchstone Fellowship awardees: Brianne Anderson and Neville Barbour.

Anderson and Barbour were selected from an extremely talented group of artist applicants from DC, Maryland, and Virginia. The TFA Fellowship provides membership at Touchstone Gallery, mentoring by established artists, participation in gallery group shows, and a solo exhibition.

Brianne Anderson, ‘22 - ’24

Brianne Anderson is a figurative artist from Southwest Florida, now based in Washington, DC. Her practice mainly involves oil painting, printmaking, and drawing and is based primarily in self-portraiture, also incorporating imagery from her home and her life. Her work addresses themes of introversion, self-obsession, vulnerability, loneliness, and humor. She uses imagery of herself and things from her life, translated through surrealism and fiction, to playfully explore these themes and to build a mythology around herself—creating a narrative that does not necessarily require a linear storytelling framework. Brianne has a BFA in Studio Art from BYU, and is a current MFA Studio Art Candidate at American University (expected 2023).

Neville Barbour, ‘22 - ’24

Neville Barbour is a DC native, primarily working with charcoal. He believes that our past remains with us for a reason: We must choose how to reinterpret it. We must process it so that it does not fester. He makes art that brings his past and others' past alive. He searches for the black, the white, and the “indelible” gray. Neville has participated in dozens of domestic and international juried exhibitions, including being awarded “Best in Show” at Touchstone Gallery’s 2020 exhibition, Us. He also exhibited at the Museum of Science + Industry in Chicago, IL for their 2022 Black Creativity exhibition, and has a piece in the permanent collection at the David Driskell Center for the Study of Visual Arts & Culture of African Americans and the African Diaspora.

Steve Wanna, ‘19 - ‘22

Steve Wanna is a multi-disciplinary sound and visual artist whose work includes music, sound design for dance collaborations, sculpture, installation, photography, and works for mixed media. Born and raised in Lebanon, he immigrated to the United States with his family as a teenager, eventually receiving a doctorate in Music Composition from the University of Maryland in 2004. Most of Wanna’s work generally falls into one of two categories informed by the principles of emergence and auspicious coincidence as defined in systems theory, swarm intelligence theory, and Buddhism: under the right conditions, great beauty can emerge without much intervention. The first category includes works that highlight or capture the moment of their creation, a process frozen in anticipation of the potential of unfolding. These works are usually mixed media and draw on experimental techniques that use materials like paints, powders, and wax in atypical ways. The second includes works that are in constant flux, perpetually in states of becoming rather than being. These tend to utilize various electronic components driven by software designed by the artist to create carefully controlled randomness, which imbues the works with a sense of autonomous life. His work has been presented at home and abroad.

Jenny Wu, '18–'22

Born in Nanjing, China, Jenny holds BAs in Studio Art and Architectural Studies from William Smith College (which is coequal with Hobart College) in Geneva, New York, and an MFA in Studio Art from American University in Washington, DC. She is currently an adjunct faculty at Marymount University in Arlington, VA, and at American University. Her work has been exhibited in galleries including Denise Bibro in New York City, NY, and in the Katzen Arts Center at American University. Wu has participated in numerous artist-in-residence programs across the country and has been awarded fellowships from the Vermont Studio Center and the Pollock–Krasner Foundation.

Michael Cabezas, ‘19 - ‘21

Michael Cabezas is a multi-disciplinary artist who works primarily with drawing, video, and sculpture. Sarcasm and melancholy emerge as the atmosphere of a hybrid media practice that celebrates the hollowness of American Suburbia. Projects that are both anecdotal and implicate of childhood request a reflection from a jaded population. His work often overlaps pop-culture with playful cynicism to form a dialogue about the antics and absurdity of a class.

Carol Ann Moore, '16–'19

A native of Maryland, Carol studied Graphic Design at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, in Baltimore, MD. She also lived in Kuwait and Jordan for several years. She's worked as a technical illustrator, a paste-up artist, an art director for two different retail companies, a mural painter, a drama set designer/painter, and an artist-in-residence in Montgomery County Public Schools. Her first foray into printmaking was when she took a college intaglio course in the 80s. In 2010, Carol went back to school at Montgomery College in Rockville, Maryland, where she rediscovered intaglio and other forms of printmaking.

Susi Cora, '16–'18

Susi Cora is a visual artist who works in Alexandria, VA, and Washington, DC. She trained as an architect, having attended the School of Architecture at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY, and she completed her MFA at the George Washington University in Washington, DC, in 2016. Her art practice is informed by her "lifelong interest in the natural world" and is a process-driven practice that forms a conspiratorial and primeval relationship between materiality and concept. Her works have been exhibited in galleries including Touchstone Gallery in Washington, DC, Gallery 102 in Washington, DC, and Target Gallery in Alexandria, VA. 

Lionel Daniels, '15–'17

Lionel paints with his hands while simultaneously dancing to themed music. His artworks may incorporate poetry, drama and digital media. He graduated from Morehouse College in 2011 with a summa cum laude BA in Studio Art, joining Phi Beta Kappa. In his junior year at Morehouse, during a pageant, he discovered his ability to performance paint. Inspired by the loss of his favorite performer Michael Jackson, Lionel was motivated to create a tribute piece that bore his style of performance painting. Lionel has performed at numerous events at the Atlanta University Center, schools and churches in metro Atlanta, Alabama, Louisiana, the World Congress Center, and several festivals including the National Black Arts Festival (2012-13), Sweet Auburn Fest (2012-13), and the Power of You Teens in Harlem (2014). He has exhibited work at the Roswell Cultural Art Center, the Atlanta Beltline Project (2013), and was recognized by the state of Georgia Legislature in Resolution 772. 

Jo Ann Block, '15–'17

Jo Ann Block is a Washington, DC, based mixed media artist investigating queer history, sexuality and identity as they are inscribed within historical and contemporary culture. She received her BFA from the University of California, Los Angeles in California, and her MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. She held a fellowship with Touchstone Gallery in Washington, DC, and two summer residencies at the School of Visual in NY. Her work has been exhibited at American University Museum (DC), Transformer Gallery (DC) Williamsburg Art and Historical Center (NY) Metrospace (MI), Baum Gallery of Fine Art (AK), Thompson Gallery (MA) and Ventura College Art Gallery (CA).

Aleksandra Katargina, '13–'14

Aleksandra Katargina was born in Moscow, Russia. She attended school in Russia until she was 14, when she moved to the US. As a child, she was inspired by her mother’s drawings. When she finished high school, she decided to pursue a career in art. She received her BFA from Maryland Institute College of Art. She lives and works in Maryland.

John Edmonds, '13

John Edmonds is a photographer who lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. He received his MFA in Photography from Yale University School of Art and his BFA in Photography at the Corcoran School of Arts and Design. He is recognized for his performative gestures and his self-fashioning of young black men on the streets of America; he also makes evocative portraits of lovers, close friends and strangers. His Fine Print Program print is part of an ongoing series of portraits of men wearing du-rags, made in Syracuse during his residency at Light Work. He has also held residencies at the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture and Fabrica: The United Colors of Benneton’s Research Center. Recent exhibitions include tete-a-tete at David Castillo Gallery, Miami, FL, Do You See Me? at the Diggs Gallery at Winston-Salem University, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and James Baldwin/Jim Brown & The Children at The Artist’s Institute, New York, NY. His work is in both private and public collections, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art, FOAM Museum Amsterdam Library, and the George Eastman Museum. Edmonds is represented by ltd los angeles.

NEWS: ESSAY: ABOUT 2015-2016 Emerging Artist Fellows

By Rosemary Luckett, May 2015
This year the Touchstone Gallery artist members circles includes four Touchstone Foundation for the Arts sponsored Fellowship members, two of whom will solo in June 2017. The four are Lionel Daniels, Susi Cora, Jo Ann Block and Carol Moore. Each is working in a different medium and each is working towards a unique goal. Their work can be seen in each monthly Touchstone exhibit.

Touchstone Foundation for the Arts (TFA) is proud to sponsor these four gifted artists.  TFA, a nonprofit tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organization, was created by the artists of Touchstone Gallery to increase their engagement with the community around them and to accept donations to make that possible. Their inaugural project was the creation of the TFA Fellowship for Emerging Artists.

Carol Moore

Printmaker Carol Moore allows her fascination with the natural world to guide her inspiration, whether it is a tiny plant specimen or an animal that catches her attention. Her current works seeks to elaborate on the origins of the plant and animals as well as the plates used in the printmaking process. As the plate takes a greater role, the divide between the matrix and the printed image is blurred and the evidence of plate characteristics cannot be ignored.

Susi Cora

Susi Cora, while working in an entirely different medium, share’s Carol’s observation and attention to the natural world.  Susi’s art practice is currently focused upon abstract ceramic sculpture and she utilize slabs, tablets and totems to communicate stillness and metamorphosis. Surfaces are reminiscent of nature’s processes of accretion and erosion and the textures and patterns are taken from imagery of geologic formations, shorelines modeled by the wind and tides, and lichen-covered fountains.

The sculptures are hand built using pressed slab and coiling methods. Surface treatments are highly textural, composed of manipulated layers of clay and slip. A variety of oxides and stains are utilized combined with limited applications of matte and crackle glazes. The work is fired using both conventional and pit firing methods. This way of working aligns with the natural processes of the earth and parallels eons of human experience.

Lionel Daniels

While Susi manipulates clay with her hands, Lionel Daniels only paints with his hands. For him, the brush is the middle man that must be eliminated. A true finger painter, Lionel creates figurative photo expressionist paintings that depict Black Life and the day to day struggles and triumphs of African Americans that still exist today. The purpose of this work is for his audience to honor the ancestor, recognize the message, and spark an internal dialogue within them. Lionel is also exploring the political arena in his current works.

Jo Ann Block

Jo Ann Block is a multimedia artist constructing her works from physical items at hand, large pieced together drawings,  and digital collage fragments joined on the computer. Jo Ann presents autobiographical collages, piecing together her trajectory from growing up queer and her struggle toward emancipation from social stigma. The collages are an amalgam of historical and personal imagery using a range of materials and methods to cut and paste a complex identity.