2024 Cultivating Community | https://nceca.net/2024-cultivating-community

Announcing Inaugural Recipient of the Innovator Award

Sana Musasama

NCECA is thrilled to introduce Sana Musasama as the first recipient of the 2024 NCECA Innovator Award. Members of the award selection committee for this, the inaugural year of this honor include Holly Hannesian, Anya Montiel, Garth Johnson, Angelik Vizcarrondo-Laboy, Ife Williams, and Sequoia Miller with Shoji Satake serving as chair, and Rhonda Willers as co-chair.

Sana's work profoundly connects with our collective understanding of the power of objects in the universe, serving as agents to break down cultural barriers, educate us about our differences, and promote healing. Her innovative approach to community outreach is exemplified in her recent project, the “Apron Project,” where she collaborates with girls to develop entrepreneurial skills, enabling them to create products and earn income, thus achieving financial independence from the harsh streets of Cambodia. She integrates her lived experiences in the US, Sierra Leone, Vietnam, and Cambodia, using color, pattern, texture, and adornment to reveal life's deeper meanings.

Sana's entire practice is deeply influenced by her cultural traditions, as well as those of West Africa and Asia. Within the United States, she draws inspiration from urban and marginalized communities. Over more than 40 years, she has taught in neighborhood community centers, correctional facilities, and universities/colleges.

Sana Musasama earned her BA from City College of New York in 1973, and her MFA from Alfred University, New York, in 1988. Musasama received the 2018 Achievement Award from the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts for her years of teaching and her humanitarian work with victims of sex trafficking in Cambodia. Musasama is the coordinator of the Apron Project, a sustainable entrepreneurial project for girls and young women reintegrated back into society after being forced into sex trafficking. In 2016, she was a guest speaker on “Activism through Art” at ROCA. A recently published article by Cliff Hocker, “If I can Help Somebody: Sana Musasama’s Art of Healing,” appears in the International Review of African American Art. In 2015, the Museum of Art and Design in New York selected four works from The Unspeakable Series for their private collection; Musasama was awarded the ACLU of Michigan Art Prize 7 and Art Prize 8. In 2002, she was awarded Anonymous Was a Women and in 2001, Musasama was featured in the 2001 Florence Biennial. Her work is in multiple collections such as The Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina; The Museum of Art and Design in New York, New York; the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum in New York, New York; the Hood Museum of Art in Hanover, New Hampshire; The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York; Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem, New York; Bluffton University in Bluffton, Ohio; and in numerous private collections. Musasama lives and works in New York.