Michele Wood

Michele Wood

Michele Wood is an artist whose work defies all boundaries. As a painter, illustrator, designer and writer, she has gained wide recognition in the United States. She has been honored with the prestigious American Book Award for her first book, Going Back Home and by the American Library Association with the 1999 Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award for her book, I See the Rhythm. Her work, which has been exhibited in major venues nationally, reflects an essential sense of history and place. She lives in Indianapolis, Indiana. www.michelewood.com, iseetherhythm.com.

Michele Wood is the recipient of over 30 awards and honors. Michele was awarded the Ashley Bryan Illustrator Children Book Award in 2012. Her Art quilt was chosen for Glory Kilanko’s Video at the National Center for Civil and Human Rights in 2012. The release of I Lay My Stitches Down, text by Cynthia Grady, won the 2013 Gold Nautilus award, 2012 recipient of the NYPL Children’s Book List and more.

Michele’s art has been exhibited in museums and galleries in the USA. Her art is included in private art collections the Indiana State Museum, Tubman Museum and more. A native of Indianapolis, Indiana, the amazing story of Michele’s rise as an artist began with her graduation in 1991 from the American College for Applied Arts- last named American Intercontinental University in Atlanta, Georgia under Steve Steinman. In 1994, the Apex Museum awarded the artist with a grant that allowed her to embark upon a pilgrimage to Yoruba Land in Africa. She was mentored by the international acclaimed sculpture Lamidi Olande Fakaye. It gave Michele an appreciation for aesthetics and led to her first publication Going Back Home: An Artist Return to the South (1996), a book that explores her family’s rural Southern heritage. Wood drew inspiration from her African heritage, Southern African-American roots, American quilts, African textiles and everyday experiences.

Michele Wood appears in

  • Step into the words and paintings of award-winning writers and artists as we celebrate black history in literary color. Award-winning artist Michele Wood’s work reflects a deep sense of history and place.

  • In one of her last interviews, the late Dr. Maya Angelou spent time with us to share her early life, lessons learned along her adult journey and golden nuggets of wisdom.

  • In what would become one of her final interviews, World Footprints enjoyed a intimate chat with "Global Renaissance Woman" Dr. Maya Angelou.  Dr. Angelou shared some wisdom, insights and stories from her incredible life's journey, including the transitional relationship with her mother Vivian Baxter.  Her mother shared messages of courage, hope, forgiveness and unlimited possibilities and those messages are what Dr. Angelou attributed to many of her life's blessings.  Dr. Angelou joined us to talk about her last book "Mom & Me & Mom" and she generously offered nuggets of wisdom for everyone.  Dr. Angelou's time with us was the most memorable interaction we've ever experienced and we greatly miss her presence. We continue along the heart's path and take a short trip to a city that is near and dear to us--Detroit, where we share the city's great comeback and one of the greatest reinvention stories in America. Finally we chat [...]

  • World Footprints travels today in celebration of gospel music, in the enjoyment of Panda havens, and in search of the warmth of other suns.  First, Coretta Scott King Illustrator award-winning artist Michele Wood will join us to talk about her newest book, I See the Rhythm of Gospel.  Then, TV naturalist Nigel Marven, the Jack Hannah of Britain, will stop by to talk about his latest adventures of living on Panda reserves in China.  Finally, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson shares the stories and inspirations behind her first book, The Warmth of Other Suns: the epic story about America’s Great Migration. From 1915 to 1970, this exodus of almost six million people - America's Great Migration, changed the face of America. Wilkerson compares this epic migration to the migrations of other peoples in history. She interviewed more than a thousand people, and gained access to new data and official records, [...]