Conversation | Stories in Art: The Shared Path of Syd Carpenter and Sana Musasama

 

Artists Syd Carpenter and Sana Musasama will reflect on their lives as artists and teachers, exploring the power of creativity and imagination to build meaningful connections. In conversation with one another, they will discuss their artistic practices, shared sources of inspiration, the challenges they have navigated as ceramic artists, and the enduring friendship that has supported and enriched their work over the years.

 

Sana Musasama’s ceramic and mixed-media works are influenced by her global travels and lifelong engagement with women’s studies. Her practice draws on a rich array of indigenous artistic traditions, incorporating both traditional and innovative approaches to clay and other materials. Musasama’s work is driven by concerns for women’s safety, particularly the rituals involved in rites of passage and female chastity. She 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 and received the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts Outstanding Achievement Award for her teaching and humanitarian work with victims of sex trafficking in Cambodia and the United States. Her work is in the collections of the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture (NYC), the Mint Collection (Charlotte, NC), and in numerous private collections.

 

Syd Carpenter is known for her ceramic and sculpture work that explores identity, memory, and the stewardship of land inspired by African American gardens and farms. Working primarily in clay but often incorporating materials such as steel, wood, and found objects, she creates sculptural portraits that honor the histories of Black American land caretakers and the communities shaped by their labor. Carpenter is Professor Emerita at Swarthmore College, where she taught ceramics and sculpture for 31 years. Her work is found in the collections of renowned institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art,  Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Institute, Montreal Museum of Art, the Swedish National Museum, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Tang Museum of Skidmore College, RISD Museum of Art, Fuller Craft Museum, James Michener Museum, the Woodmere, and the African American Museum of Philadelphia.