Faith Ringgold, born 1930 in Harlem, New York, is a painter, mixed media sculptor, performance artist, writer, teacher and lecturer. She received her B.S. and M.A. degrees in visual art from the City College of New York in 1955 and 1959, and is best known for her narrative quilts (i.e., paintings that she quilts), which represent the development of craft into fine art. 

She is a master of many media, including sculpture and books. Her first book, Tar Beach, was based on a quilt with the same title. Written for children of all ages, this book has won over thirty awards including the coveted Caldecott Honor and the Coretta Scott King award. She has been an art educator both in public schools and in higher education. Her work weaves compelling, powerful stories of American life as seen through the lens of the African American female experience.

Ringgold’s work has been exhibited in museums and galleries around the world including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts Boston and the Smithsonian American Art Museum. She is the recipient of more than 75 awards, notably the National Endowment of the Arts award for sculpture, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation fellowship for painting and the National Endowment of the Arts Award for painting. She is a Professor Emeritus of Art at the University of California in San Diego and has received 23 Honorary Doctorates.

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