Born Harlem, NY, 1937; Died Baltimore, MD, 2022

Valerie Maynard was exposed to the power of art and social justice from a young age. She studied printmaking at the New School for Social Research, New York, in 1969; that same year, Maynard was hired as the first artist-in-residence at the newly established Studio Museum in Harlem, where she established and directed their printmaking workshop. In 1977, she received her master’s degree in sculpture from Goddard College, Vermont.

She would go on to an influential career as a mentor, activist, and artist. Her stature within the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s and 1970s stems from how she engaged with global struggles for civil rights and made teaching central to her career. Maynard was an artist-in-residence at the Blue Mountain Center, New York (1987–1991); Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge (1992); and the Susan B. Anthony Institute for Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies, University of Rochester, New York (1992–1994). She also taught across educational levels, including high schools, colleges, and universities, such as the Langston Hughes Library, New York (1971–1974), Howard University, Washington, D.C. (1974–1976), and the Baltimore School for the Arts, Maryland (1980–1981), to name but a few.

Maynard’s work combines an attention to nature and found materials with resourcefulness, urbanity, and grit. Much of her oeuvre bridges traditional distinctions between printmaking, drawing, and sculpture. Additionally, Maynard executed several large-scale public works. In 1990, she participated in the Public Art Fund’s Messages to the Public, an electronic billboard in Times Square. Polyrhythmics of Consciousness and Light (2003), her series of glass mosaic murals, remains permanently installed at New York’s 125th Street/Lexington Avenue subway station. Other public artworks have been commissioned by Baltimore City College (1980) and the Boston Art Commission, City of Boston (2002).