Amy Sherald, the Columbus-born artist who painted former first lady Michelle Obama’s official portrait, is on the inaugural TIME100 Art list and is the first living painter to appear solo on the magazine’s cover in 50 years.
Sherald remembers being one of only several Black students attending a private school in Columbus. According to the National Museum of Women in Art, she credits this experience as shaping how she thinks about race and identity in her work.
And the Ledger-Enquirer reported in 2023 that Sherald, a 1991 graduate of St. Anne-Pacelli Catholic School, credits the late renowned artist Geri Davis, who taught at the school, for planting a seed that inspired her career.
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