Personal Overview

Nancy Blair, MFA is both an artist and author. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Alfred University in New York and a Master of Fine Arts in Visual Studies from Rutgers University, Mason Gross School of the Arts in New Jersey. She is both a professional artist and an art educator teaching online for over fifteen years including the following courses: Art Appreciation, Integrated Arts, Mythology, Visual Communications History, Visual Communication and Design. Drawing Concepts, Art History, 2D Design, 3D Design, Information Graphics, Design Development, Typography, Folklore and Culture, Women's Art History, Contemporary Humanities, Contemporary Art. On Ground she has taught studio art including Sculpture, 3D Design, Drawing, Ceramics and Glass Casting.  She has authored 5 books on art and ancient myths.

Professor Blair most recently completed a one-year appointment in Taiyuan, China as the Executive Artistic Director & Curator of YZ Creative Art Center where she oversaw the development of the largest glass center in Asia working with architects, engineers and vendors to design, equip and supply a multi-disciplinary art program.

In 2014 she was an artist resident at the Dream Community Cultural Foundation in Taipei, Taiwan. During her residency she designed a "Healing Garden" space in a courtyard area for a residential building project.

She has been honored with a Hauberg Fellowship and a Professional Artist in Residency at Pilchuck Glass School www.pilchuck.com in Februay 2011, May 2008 and March 2007 respectively. She taught glass casting at Pilchuck Glass School in 2006, 2008, 2010. She is also a scholarship recipient, staff member, and teaching assistant there. In addition, she has been a teaching assistant at The Studio of the Corning Museum of Glass in New York, and Wheaton Village (Museum of American Glass, Millville, New Jersey).

Her business expertise is extensive. She was the president of Star River Productions, a manufacturing and mail order catalog company, for over thirteen years. Her responsibilities included oversight of product development, outsourcing, advertising, marketing, and catalog creation including photography, graphic design, and copy writing. Her experience and expertise in creative services and marketing during this time was highly regarded in many newspapers including the New Yorker magazine and other business journals. She was the first in her city to be awarded Community Business Association funding. She was a prominent member of the Rutgers University “Business Innovative Center” and the New Jersey Association of Women Business Owners.”

Her art work has been commissioned by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Oliver Stone’s The Doors Project, the Franklin Mint and the United States Olympic Equestrian Museum. Her recent book, Thank You, Your Opinion Means Nothing To Me, a memoir, is published by HarperCollinsPublishers. She received critical acclaim in USAWeekend Magazine, Florida Today, and a highly regarded review by Olympia Dukakis. Interviews have appeared in New Yorker magazine, and she was listed in Manhattan Arts Magazine as an artist “to watch.” She has won numerous awards and grants including the Manhattan Council for the Arts Award.

She is represented by Traver Gallery in Seattle, Washington having had a solo exhibition of her glass sculpture in May 2009. Her mostly narrative sculptures and installation works combine cast glass, ceramics, photography, works on paper, found objects and a series of videos entitled "One Minutes Meds." Her work is in the collection of Sir Elton John, Rutgers University Marjorie Douglass Library, The Museum of Modern Art, the National Equestrian Museum and the Museum of Glass in Tacoma, Washington.

In 2011 recently she was commissioned by the Oregon Council of Art for a public arts installation at Western Oregon State University in Monmouth, Oregon. The work includes cast glass and carved wood by Rick Bartow.

In 2012 she worked as the project manager in collaboration with Rick Bartow on a permanent sculpture installation for the Smithsonian Institute's National Museum of the American Indian.

This is what Ms. Blair says about here art:

My work stems from a lifelong interest in mythology and shamanic traditions. I am particularly fascinated by the voluptuous excesses that accumulate, clutter and distract, and at the same time can elevate the ordinary detritus of daily life into extraordinary objects that demand attention and reverence, transforming the psyche at deep healing levels.

By combining everyday found objects, iconic collectibles, precious and not so precious memorabilia in a new and vital way, I am creating a curious, evocative and powerful menagerie of metaphorical figures and alchemies: objects of myths and memory that are torn and fragmented then re-constructed for a deeper meaning.

Like the wandering mystic, I am seeking the sacred dimensions in the routine of daily experience. Working in glass suits this journey: it is demanding and intense, and like life, is potentially unpredictable, entirely rewarding.