Penn professors Michelle Lopez and Tyshawn Sorey named 2024 Pew Fellows in the Arts

Penn professors Michelle Lopez and Tyshawn Sorey have been awarded 2024 Pew Fellowships in the Arts.

The fellowship, awarded by The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage since 1992, recognizes artists in the Philadelphia region each year and provides support for their creative endeavors. Lopez is a sculptor and Fine Arts professor at the Weitzman School of Design, and Sorey is a Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and Presidential Assistant Professor of Music in the School of Arts and Sciences. 

The fellowship program awarded 12 fellowships this year, totaling to $1 million. Each fellow receives an unrestricted grant of $85,000, along with access to professional advancement resources including financial counseling, workshops, and artist residency opportunities.

Lopez, known for her innovative sculptural installations that engage viewers in thought-provoking experiences, told The Daily Pennsylvanian that her artistic philosophy centers her audience on the sociocultural moments that interest her.

"My ethos has always been that I want it to engage a viewer so that they can think about the world and see it in a more amplified way,” Lopez said. “A lot of my work has been dealing with the social and political climate of instability and impending collapse. In some ways, I want to give myself agency as an artist to create impossible moments."

Lopez's work often explores themes of cultural identity, visibility, and the intersection of personal experiences with broader societal issues and cultural movements.

“I grew up in an immigrant family. My parents came from the Philippines during the 1965 Immigration Act, when [the United States] needed more doctors and nurses,” Lopez said. “I think my work has been trying to grapple with how to make the invisible visible, as well as my relationship to my own sense of visibility as a female, brown person.”

Lopez’s art frequently critiques dominant cultures, whether it be artistic movements or dominant institutional thinking. This perspective is evident in pieces such as Rope Prop Reversal, her monumental sculpture that challenges traditional notions of minimalist art. 

"I wanted to respond to [male minimalist sculptures] by using unlikely material to assemble into this big monolithic sculpture by using rope,” Lopez said. “I’m still using the same material that the sculptures use. I'm still using steel, and so I'm making my own rope out of steel, and then electrostatically flocking it in nylon to make it look like rope."

Donna Frisby-Greenwood, senior vice president leading The Pew Charitable Trusts' work in Philadelphia, has noted the importance of supporting a diverse cultural sector. The nine-foot-tall sculpture, which appears to be on the verge of collapse yet somehow maintains its form, serves as a metaphor for the delicate balance of cultural assimilation and preservation experienced by many immigrants and their children.

The Pew Fellowships support Philadelphia's arts scene, providing artists with the financial freedom and resources to pursue large-scale projects and advance their careers. 

Donna Frisby-Greenwood, the senior vice president leading The Pew Charitable Trusts' work in Philadelphia, has noted the importance of supporting a diverse cultural sector.

"We look forward to seeing how these grantees use their exceptional creativity to spark important social conversations — and produce accessible works of art for Philadelphia-area residents and visitors to enjoy,” Frisby-Greenwood said in a press release.

Lopez also sees the fellowship as an opportunity to further enrich her teaching and mentorship of emerging artists as a reciprocal relationship.

"I love the conversations I have with my students and how they keep me engaged and challenge me to think outside of the way that I usually think,” Lopez said. “I think if I weren't teaching, the work wouldn't be as dynamic."

Lopez's recent work has focused on pushing the boundaries of traditional sculptures, incorporating technology and multimedia elements to create immersive experiences. 

"Right now, I've been working on this project since I arrived in Pennsylvania, where I've been thinking about sculpture as becoming, because sculpture inherently is three dimensional,” Lopez said. “It's this multimedia installation that involves 360 film and a live performance with violas. There is also this robot that I've been working on with engineers in the engineering program."

The Pew Fellowships are part of a larger grant program by The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, which awarded a total of $10.2 million to 39 artists and organizations in 2024. This substantial investment in the region's cultural ecosystem emphasizes the Center's commitment to fostering artistic excellence and innovation in Philadelphia.

For Lopez, the fellowship represents not only a form of financial support, but also an affirmation of her artistic vision and her place within the Philadelphia arts community. 

"It feels humbling to realize I've been chipping away at this for a long time, and so it allows me to have more faith in the work that I'm doing,” Lopez said. “It's great to get validation when I'm embarking on this really complex project.”