Vaughn Sills

Artist Statement

My deep interest, visible in all of my work, involves how we are influenced by the land and how we influence it, how cultures evolve in relation to (and affect) their "natural" environment, just as we, as individuals, evolve, becoming who we are because of our families, and our psychological and environmental circumstances. My current body of work, True Poems Flee, is a visual memoir about Prince Edward Island, a way of life that was my mother's as a child, and my grieving for her. I photograph most often at dawn or the early morning, attempting to create images that honor the past, convey the feelings and complexity of grief, and recognize the present.

Artist Bio

Vaughn Sills' interests involve how we are influenced by and how we influence the land, how cultures evolve in relation to (and affect) their physical environment, as well as how individuals become who we are because of our families, social and environmental circumstances.

Vaughn's photographs have been exhibited in museums and galleries. Her work has been shown at the DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park, Gibbes Museum in Charleston SC, the DuSables Museum of African American History in Chicago, the US Botanic Garden in Washington, DC, and the Carpenter Center of Arts at Harvard University. Her gallery exhibits include the Ellen Miller Gallery and Davis Orton Gallery. Her two most recent solo shows were at Griffin Museum of Photography (2019) and Trustman Art Gallery at Simmons University.

Her work is in the collections of the DeCordova Museum, Harvard Art Museum, Eaton Vance, Fidelity, and Simmons University. Thirty-four photographs from her series of African American Gardens were recently acquired by the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Vaughn's work has earned a number of awards. From the Massachusetts Cultural Council, she received two Artist's Fellowships in Photography, and twice she was also named a Finalist. She has also received grants from Artadia Dialogue for Art and Culture, the Polaroid Foundation, The New England Foundation for the Arts, and the President's Fund for Faculty Excellence from Simmons University. Two books of Vaughn's work have been published: Places for the Spirit, Traditional African American Gardens (Trinity University, 2010) and One Family (University of Georgia, 2001).

Vaughn is a Visiting Scholar at Brandeis University's Women's Studies Research Center and Associate Professor Emerita of Photography at Simmons University. She lives and works in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Prince Edward Island, Canada.

Work available on Artsy