Artist Uses Her Head to Win Top Prize in Art Competition

Sonya Clark, chair of the department of craft and material studies at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, shared the first prize at ArtPrize, an international competition held annually in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She will split the $200,000 first place cash award.

Clark enlisted 12 hairstylists to craft her head into a work of art for the judges consideration.

Clark is a native of Washington, D.C. Both of her parents are from the Caribbean. She is a graduate of Amherst College in Massachusetts. She earned a bachelor of fine arts degree at the Art Institute of Chicago and a master of fine arts degree from the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. Before joining the faculty at Virginia Commonwealth University, Clark was the Baldwin-Bascom Professor of Creative Arts at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.