THE ARTIST
To behave as an artist is to dance awkwardly in the nude before many. If artists are to survive their critics and themselves, they must die and be resurrected multiple times by the very same society and inner monologue that killed their confidence in art making. To proclaim oneself an artist, is to crown oneself, even when the court of public opinion may not accept you as a queen or king. Patricia R. Corbett
Patricia's art examines social, political, racial, religious, and cultural matters that affect populations whose bodies, voices, and stories are muted, overlooked, misrepresented, or absent from conversations that elevate their existence. Making room and holding space for them, she observes, witnesses, creates, and tells stories that challenge a variety of audiences to recognize, experience, and acknowledge the humanity within and outside themselves.
Patricia's graduate thesis,
Answering the Call of My People: Captured Fractured Buried Excavated Reassembled Set Free, is a collection of complete and excerpted works that map her journey of finding, discovering, examining, reflecting, and reclaiming of ancestry, family, community, and self. Answering the Call of My People features a play and novel excerpt, essays, short stories, poetry, music, photographs, blog posts, and music referencing themes that include genealogical/familial ties, gender identity, re-membering the dead, race, and culture from an African-American lesbian’s perspective. Her current one-woman show, The Perils of a Southern Black Woman: stories, tales, and nightmares told in the light is based on this critical analysis. See more under projects.
Patricia R. Corbett, Interdisciplinary Artist
SOCIAL & COMMUNITY JUSTICE
photo courtesy of Lorna Reese
Patricia R. Corbett is a storyteller, award-winning playwright, educator, personal historian, editor, and entrepreneur. Her passions include art, community service, social justice, and education. Patricia holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Virginia Union University and a Master of Fine Arts degree in Interdisciplinary Arts from Goddard College, Plainfield, VT. Among her many accomplishments, in 2007 she received an Individual Artist Award from the Maryland State Arts Council for her play, Fall of the House of Snow. She served on the DC Black Pride Board of Directors and the DC Capital Pride Community Planning Committee and received the 2014 DC Black Pride Welmore Cook Award for outstanding community service and the Banks-Koegel Commitment Award from Youth Pride Alliance for her commitment to LGBTQ youth. In 2017, Diversity Richmond awarded her an RVA Unsung Black LGBTQ Community award. She is a featured Virginia artist in the 2017 Sinister Wisdom 104 Lesbianima Rising: Lesbian Feminist Art in the South, 1974-1996.