Myrna Balk

Through her expressive sculptures of clay, bamboo and steel and a broad grasp of printmaking technique, including etchings, monotypes and woodcuts, Myrna Balk asserts the essential dignity and humanity of abused women. With a light, almost innocent touch, her allegorical works brings us into shadowy environments that feel both domesticated and dangerous.  Her courageous guidance empowers us to look with compassion on victims sex trafficking, genital mutilation, hunger, and the Holocaust.

Balk attended the University of Iowa, Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.  She began to work in larger scale after studying welding with Anthony Caro in 1983. Her work was shown in Beijing in 1995 in conjunction with the 4th United Nations World Conference on Women.  And her work has been shown internationally in Cleveland, Glasgow, Beijing, Budapest, and Nepal.

She recently completed a Dunes Residency at the Cape Cod National Seashore in Provincetown, MA (2015).  In an international residency, in 2008, at the Ambani Foundation in Mumbai, India, she created large-scale works in marble, sandstone and bamboo that are included in its permanent collection.

Balk has received grants from the Brookline Commission For The Arts in 2006 and 2002, and also from the Cambridge Council For The Arts in 2002.   In her companion field of social work, Balk was awarded a Centennial Alumni Award from the Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland,  and she also received The Beverly Ross Fliegel Social Work Policy and  Change Award from the National Association of Social Work in 2003.   She has also received numerous awards for her sculptural gardens from the City of Boston.                                                          email: email@example.com
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