Artists

Dawn Williams Boyd is an American artist celebrated for her monumental “cloth paintings,” in which she reinterprets the traditions of quilting, embroidery, and fabric assemblage into contemporary narrative works. Raised in Atlanta in a family of educators, Boyd attended local parochial schools before earning her BFA in Studio Art from Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri, in 1974.

Working through a collage-like process of stitching together fabric, Boyd constructs intricate scenes that draw on art history, religious symbolism, and current events. Her work addresses African American history, everyday Black life, and broader social and political themes, including feminism, sexuality, immigration, and xenophobia. Her textile-based practice positions traditional craft within an expansive contemporary framework.

Boyd has been active in Black visual arts communities, participating in the collectives ULOZI and Sankofa Art Collective in Denver (1989–2010) and AAFTA—African Americans for the Arts—in Atlanta since 2011. After retiring from a long career with a major air carrier in 2009, she returned to Atlanta in 2010, where she continues her studio practice. She is represented by Fort Gansevoort Gallery in New York.

Her work has been exhibited widely, including at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, High Museum of Art, Birmingham Museum of Art, Minneapolis Institute of Art, Everson Museum of Art, Mingei International Museum, Hauser & Wirth (New York, Los Angeles, Somerset), Mercedes-Benz Art Collection, and Almine Rech, Brussels. Major institutional holdings include the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Equal Justice Initiative, High Museum of Art, Everson Museum of Art, and Mercedes-Benz Art Collection. In 2021, the multi-venue solo exhibition Dawn Williams Boyd: Woe toured the University of Georgia’s Lamar Dodd School of Art, the Everson Museum, and Sarah Lawrence College.

Boyd is married to artist Irvin Wheeler and is the mother of three children and grandmother of six.