Nastassja Swift

2024 Brandford/Elliott Award for Excellence in Fiber Art Recipient

Nastassja Swift is a multi-disciplinary artist redefining her use of portraiture through wool to create work that speaks to geographical histories, ancestry, ritual practices and community. She is a Virginia Commonwealth University alum, holding a BFA in Painting and Printmaking, and Craft and Material Studies. Most recently, Nastassja was selected as the 2024 Textile Society of America Brandford Elliott Awardee. She is a 2023 recipient of the Center for Craft: Craft Research Fund Artist Fellowship, a VMFA Fellowship, a Dr. Doris Derby Award, an Art Matters Fellowship Award, the inaugural Black Box Press Foundation Art as Activism Grant, a Virginia Commission of the Arts Fellowship, and was nominated for the 2024 Joan Mitchell Foundation Fellowship. In 2022, she was invited as a Distinguished Fellow at the Penland School of Craft, and shortly after, was selected for a Public Arts Commission in Richmond, VA, her first large scale public art project.

Nastassja has exhibited and presented her work in institutions nationally and internationally including VCUQatar, Carl Freedman Gallery in the UK, Reginald F. Lewis Museum, Virginia MoCA, Boston University Art Galleries, University of Florida, Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) Museum of Art, Ball State University and a number of galleries across the East Coast. She has participated in residencies across the United States at the Vermont Studio Center, Penland School of Craft, the Wassaic Project in NY, SPACES in Ohio, and MASS MoCA. Her work has been published in the Berlin publication – SomeMagazine, RVA Magazine, Colossal and Arts and Culture Texas among many others.

Nastassja is currently living and working in Virginia.