Toby Buonagurio installs artwork in times square subway

Toby Buonagurio is an artist and lifelong resident of New York City.

She attended The City College of New York and graduated in 1969 with a BA in Art and in 1971 received her Masters in Art and Education from the same institution.

For nearly four decades she has created brightly colored, flamboyant ceramic sculpture. Inspired by popular culture, Toby is best known for her rhinestoned glittered, ceramic "hybrids". The themes of her work span the spectrum, from impossible stiletto heeled shoes, souped up hotrods, rococo quasi- monuments, fantastic sci-fi robots, fashion, mechanistically surreal bionics, ironic hunting trophies, exotic mermaids and undersea tableau, to peculiar clowns and theatrically altered self -portraits.

 

Toby has had 25 solo exhibitions in museums, art centers and galleries internationally, including:

  • Bronx Museum of the Arts, Bronx, New York
  • Contemporary Arts Center , New Orleans, Louisiana
  • Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, New York
  • Staller Center Fine Arts Gallery, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, New York
  • Hostos Art Gallery, Hostos Center for Arts and Culture, Bronx, New York
  • Housatonic Museum of Art, Bridgeport, Connecticut
  • Bernice Steinbaum Gallery, New York City
  • Davis Mc Clain Gallery, Houston , Texas
  • Faith Nightingale Gallery, San Diego, California
  • Gallerie Maronie, Kyoto, Japan
  • Gallery Rebecca Cooper, Washington, D.C.
  • Gallery Yves Arman, New York City
  • Jerald Melberg Gallery, Charlotte, North Carolina
  • Michael Berger Gallery, Pittsburg, Pennsylvania
  • Monique Knowlton Gallery, New York City
  • Westbroadway Gallery, New York City

Her work been included in more than 200 group exhibitions around the globe, to name a scant few:

  • The American Craft Museum, New York City
  • Grand Palais Art Contemporain, Paris, France
  • The John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, Wisconsin
  • The Mint Museum of Art, Charlotte, North Carolina
  • The Museum of Contemporary Art , Shigaraki, Japan
  • Ragaland Kunstnersenter, Stavanger, Norway
  • The Rheinisches Landesmuseum, Bonn, Germany
  • Taiwan's National Museum of History, Taiwan, China
tiger cord

Toby Buonagurio in the
42nd Street Subway

Her work is included in numerous private and public collections, among them: the Everson Museum of Art, The Mint Museum of Art, The Shigaraki Contemporary Museum of Art, and The Metropolitan Transportation Authority New York City Transit.

Toby's work has been written about extensively in professional journals, books, catalogs and periodicals including: Along the Way MTA Arts for Transit, The New York Times, The Daily News, The Village Voice, New York Newsday, New York Magazine, Art News, Arts Magazine, American Ceramics; her work has been featured on the cover of Ceramics Monthly.

She has been the recipient of numerous awards and honors for her artwork including one from the New York State Council on the Arts and five B.R.I.O. awards from the Bronx Council on the Arts, among others.

Toby is a Senior Professor and the Studio Program Coordinator for the Art Department at Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, New York, where she has taught and headed the ceramic sculpture program for over 30 years. She has traveled widely in Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean for the purpose of cultural enrichment and visual research. Toby has been married for nearly four decades to the artist Edgar Buonagurio, who is widely known for his monumentally scaled, abstract commissioned paintings.

 

Click here, for a copy of Toby Buonagurio's full resume.
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