Bullock, Barbara

Over her fifty-year career, Barbara Bullock (born 1938) has created art inspired by the mythology and culture of Africa and its diaspora. Her work has evolved from figural to abstract, most recently ruminating on questions of identity, belief, gender, and the artistic process. Born and raised in North Philadelphia and Germantown, Bullock grew up learning art in public school. She went on to train at the Fleisher Art Memorial, the Hussian School of Art, and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.

As an educator, advisor, and artist, Bullock has led classes at museums, schools, and prisons, including the New Jersey Council–funded Arts Horizon. She has executed commissions for the Philadelphia International Airport, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, SEPTA, and the Village of Arts and Humanities.

Among Bullock’s most notable awards are two-time recognition as a Distinguished Teaching Artist by the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, a Pew Fellowship in the Arts, a Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation Visual Arts Residency Grant, and a Leeway Foundation Bessie Berman Grant. Her work has been exhibited across the United States and is in the permanent collection of numerous museums and foundations in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Today she resides in Germantown.