Bonnie Collura’s multi-media sculptures, figurative textiles, and outdoor works have contributed to the dialogue of contemporary sculpture for over twenty years in exhibitions spanning the United States, France, Italy, Belgium, Germany, and India. Reviews of her work can be seen in the New York Times, The New Yorker, Art Forum, Art in America, Art News, Art Net, Flash Art, BOMB magazine, Beautiful Decay, Tema Celeste, Sculpture Magazine, and numerous print and on-line publications. Holding a B.F.A. from Virginia Commonwealth University (1994) and a M.F.A. from Yale University (1996), her work is the recipient of several honors, including a 1997 Emerging Artist Award from the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, a 2005 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship, a 2010 MacDowell Colony Fellowship, and several research grants from Penn State University. In 2021-2024, Penn State College of Engineering has partnered on her trans disciplinary project, "Together, Tacit" , which aims to inspire creative collaboration between blind, low vision, and sighted individuals. In 2022, Collura received a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Emergency Grant for the sculptural project, Seven, and became a Penn State University Changing the Future for Women Leaders (CTF) graduate.
Toggling a rigorous studio practice with a dedicated teaching career has led to an investment of art’s purpose through a younger generation in the classroom. In 2021, these two areas of scholarship were recognized through a prestigious Outstanding Educator Award from the International Sculpture Center.
Currently, Collura is a Professor of Art at Penn State University, teaching in the School of Visual Arts, College of Arts and Architecture. Prior to her appointment at Penn State she taught at Yale University, Columbia University, Virginia Commonwealth University, Rhode Island School of Design, Tyler School of Art, University of the Arts, and Parsons The New School for Design. Collura lives and works in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania with her husband, Matthew J. Olson and their extraordinary, domestic short-hair cat named Louise Bourgeois.
For current CV, please click here.
For academic curriculum vitae, please click here
For select press, please click here
2010 - present
2010 - present