Bio
Professor Edison received her MFA from the University of Pennsylvania in 1986 and her BFA from The School of Visual Arts, NYC NY 1976. Edison’s visual investigations have centered on portraiture, with an emphasis on the autobiographical. Ms. Edison creates her work using color pencil on black paper. Her images are thematically narrative in presentation and psychological in nature. Edison received her first teaching post in 1990, at SCAD. Professor Edison has been a member of the faculty at the LDSA, since 1992 promoted to full Professor in 1999. She served as Associate Director from 1997-1999. In 2002 Professor Edison was elected to a four-year term on the 25-member board of the College Art Association. In 2005 she was elected to the executive, Finance and Budget Committee of the CAA serving as Vice President for Committees, Chairing the Nominating Committee. In 2008 her college textbook: Dynamic Color Painting for the Beginner” was published by Harry Abrams in New York City and simultaneously with Laurence King Ltd in the United Kingdom. The Spanish language edition was printed in 2009 and the Chinese language 2015. Professor Edison has been represented by The George Adams Gallery in NYC NY since 1995. Her New York exhibitions have also included the Forum Gallery, the DC Moore Gallery and the Tatischef Gallery. Ms. Edison’s work has been exhibited internationally at the American Embassies of Moscow Russia, N’Djamena, Chad, and her collaborative work with the artist Mel Chin and the GALA Committee was shown at the museum of contemporary Art in LA and the KwangJu Biennale in South Korea. Ms Edison’s exhibitions have been reviewed by The New York Times, The New Yorker magazine, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, the Philadelphia Enquirer, Art News and the St. Louis Dispatch. Reproductions of her artwork were featured twice in Artists Magazine. Additionally Professor Edison is published in Who’s Who in American Art, Who’s Who in America and Who’s Who in the world
Her most recent exhibition was at the George Adams gallery NYC
“Diane Edison New Portrait drawings”
DIANE EDISON: MAJOR RESEARCH ACCOMPLISHMENTS
I have exhibited in eleven solo exhibitions, and seventy group exhibitions. The George Adams Gallery at 525 West Twenty Second Street in New York City, NY has represented my work since 1995. My other New York exhibitions have been the Henry Street Settlement Benefit at the New York Armory, the DC Moore Gallery and the Forum Gallery My exhibition record has been national, regional and international. The group exhibition “Large drawings from the Arkansas Arts Center foundation” traveled to eight different venues including the Georgia Museum of Art. My paintings have been exhibited in the official residence of the American Ambassador in Moscow, Russia, and The American Embassy in N’djamena, Chad and Sofia Bulgaria. My solo and group exhibitions in combination have been reviewed twenty-seven times in venues as varied as the New York Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer Art News, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, the Los Angeles Times and the St. Louis Dispatch. As a result of my reputation as an artist who is also committed to academia, I was selected as an outside tenure evaluator for the University of North Texas, Bowling Green State University, The Pennsylvania State University, Kansas State University, University of Miami, Wayne State University and Nanyang Technological University at Singapore
I was a visiting artist at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, SC and a Walter Gropius Master work- shop instructor. West Virginia In 2008 I was awarded an “Anonymous Was a Woman” Grant. My artwork is in collections as varied as the John T. Dyke Collection, Leeway foundation, Philadelphia, PA; Clark Atlanta University, Atlanta, GA; The Arkansas Arts Center foundation Collection and Malcolm Holzman of NY. Harry N. Abrams Inc., of New York
DIANE EDISON: MAJOR RESEARCH ACCOMPLISHMENTS
City, published my textbook, “Dynamic Color Painting For Beginners” in 2008. The textbook was additionally published in the United Kingdom through Laurence King, Ltd in London England. The Chinese and Spanish language editions were published in 2009 and 2014. In
2002 I was elected to the board of the College Art Association and elected in 2004 to the executive committee as Vice President for Committees.
In 1997 I became involved with a group collaborative project spearheaded by the artist Mel Chin titled “In the Name of the Place” which was selected to travel from the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, to the Gwang Ju Biennial in South Korea, and the Grand Arts Art Center in Kansas City, MO. This group piece was featured on National Public TV in 2004. I was awarded a travel grant to attend both the openings in Los Angeles and South Korea. This collaborative art piece included professional artists, writers, Art Historians, anthropologists and most importantly Students from the California Institute of Art and the Lamar Dodd School of Art, University of Georgia. There were over one hundred participants in this collaboration with prime time television (Melrose Place) and in what became known as the GALA committee. The acronym stands for “Georgia and Los Angeles” where most of the
Participants were from came from. In cooperation with Spelling Productions we were given access and encouraged to create objects and props for the television show “Melrose Place.” Over three hundred paintings and props were included in televised episodes of the series. Included and active in this collaboration were, the Executive Producers of Melrose Place, Frank South, Deborah Siegel, Set designer for Melrose Place and Co executive producer and writer Carol Mendelson who is most recently known as the executive producer of the CSI television series. What made this so unusual a project was that we as group worked together as equally as was possible. These objects and art pieces were eventually auctioned off at Sotheby’s in Los Angeles, CA, on November 12, 1998, by Co-chairs Susan Deal and David Booth, Sean Kelly, Susan Bay, Leonard Nimoy and Dr. Eugene P. Odum (in memory of his artist wife, Martha, REM, and Margaret Hall Silva with the proceeds going to Fulfillment Fund, Los Angeles, CA, and the Jeannette Rankin Foundation, Athens, Georgia.
