Souls Grown Deep Foundation and Community Partnership announced today that Sanford Biggers and Amy Sherald have been elected to its Board of Directors, joining an eminent group of artists, scholars, curators, activists, and nonprofit and philanthropic leaders. Both artists have strong connections to the communities and artists for whom Souls Grown Deep advocates. Sherald is a painter celebrated for her portraits of contemporary Black American life, and found inspiration in a dress design with echoes of Gee’s Bend quilts for her 2018 official portrait of former first lady Michelle Obama. Biggers is an interdisciplinary artist with quilters in his own family history, for whom Black Southern quilt making – and Gee’s Bend in particular – has been a driving creative influence, with repurposed antique quilts serving as a prominent medium and motif throughout his career.