About
Joan Sonnenfeld is a New Jersey-based artist, curator, and art educator who has contributed works to gallery and museum exhibitions nationwide, including The Fusion Art Museum in NYC, Vox Populi in Philadelphia, The George Segal Gallery at Montclair State University, The Reece Museum at Tennessee State University, ARC Gallery in Chicago, and City Without Walls in Newark, NJ.
Joan’s interest in art began with painting. Receiving guidance from her maternal aunt, Ann Santelli (an abstract expressionist painter in the 1960’s and ’70s), Joan studied at both the Westbeth Center and The Art Students League in NYC and received private tutelage from WPA painter Rita Helfond. While studying at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ, Joan received a Bachelors Degree with a concentration in Sociology and Fine Art.
Under the instruction of Leon Golub, Sonnenfeld developed an interest in socio-political ideas with an emphasis on environmental issues. This led to an investigative painting series rooted in research conducted at toxic waste sites throughout New Jersey. Due to the lethal nature of the subject, Joan felt the need to step beyond pure paint and began adding collage elements to her oil paintings. This evolved into a fascination with Dadaist and Surrealist concepts, which merged with an interest in found objects and other collage techniques. This method continues to be Joan’s primary modality to this day.
In 2011, Joan opened Hamilton Street Gallery in Bound Brook, NJ alongside her late husband, accomplished artist and musician Brian McCormack. The gallery became a community-minded, curatorial conduit through which Sonnenfeld and McCormack established rewarding, educational relationships with numerous regional and national artists.