The American Craft Council (ACC), a national nonprofit dedicated to advancing American craft, is celebrating 50 years of awards honoring individuals and organizations for exceptional artistic, scholarly, and philanthropic contributions to the craft field. Awarded biennially since 1970, the ACC Awards include the College of Fellows, the Gold Medal for Consummate Craftsmanship, the Award of Distinction, and the Aileen Osborn Webb Award for Philanthropy. This year’s awards highlight seven artists, a museum, and an advocate in the craft field who are continuing to uplift traditions while advancing the boundaries and impact of contemporary craft.

This year’s honorees will be celebrated during a formal ceremony on Saturday, October 24, 2020, at the Baltimore Museum of Art, with details forthcoming.

[Professor of Art Metals] Lisa Gralnick is a contemporary American metalsmith, studio jeweler, and academic whose work challenges the monetary, cultural, and personal value of objects by transforming metals into objects of thought-provoking visual beauty. A professor of art at the University of Wisconsin-Madison since 2001, she was previously head of the Metals/Jewelry program at Parsons School of Design. Grants and fellowships include two National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) grants, a Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation grant, four artists’ fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts, and a fellowship from the Wisconsin Arts Board. University of Wisconsin awards include the Kellett Mid-Career Award, a Vilas Associates Award, 15 faculty research grants, a Faculty Development grant, a Creative Arts Award, and the Emily Mead Baldwin Award in the Arts. Her work is in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Institution, Museum of Arts and Design in New York City, and more.