Diane Burko

Lifetime Achievement Award: Diane Burko

The Women’s Caucus for Art (WCA), a CAA affiliated society, has announced the 2011 recipients of its Lifetime Achievement Award: Beverly Buchanan, Diane Burko, Ofelia Garcia, Joan Marter, Carolee Schneemann, and Sylvia Sleigh.

A painter and photographer who resides in Philadelphia and Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Diane Burko has been involved in the feminist movement since the early 1970s. She is a founding member of WCA who also founded and organized the first multivenue feminist citywide art festival in Philadelphia, called “Philadelphia Focuses on Women in the Visual Arts, Past and Present,” also known as “Focus.” After that event, Burko continued her feminist commitment to the present day, serving on the WCA and CAA boards and on the Philadelphia Art Commission. She is now the chair of CAA’s Committee on Women in the Arts. Burko has been recognized with fellowships from the Bellagio Center, the Terra Summer Residency in Giverny, and the National Endowment for the Arts, among many other honors. One of the first movers and shakers in the feminist art movement, Burko has not yet been fully recognized for her important contributions.