Meet the Artist
BIOGRAPHY
Donna Backues is a Philadelphia-based visual artist, teaching artist, and community arts practitioner whose work centers on cultural exchange, resilience, and collective healing. She holds a BA in Studio Art and Graphic Design from Southern Illinois University, an MFA from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, and an MA in Urban Studies and Community Arts from Eastern University.
Donna lived and worked in Indonesia for 18 years, where she combined her studio practice with grassroots community development in West Java. During this time, she founded village-based community health and arts programs, co-founded a handicraft nonprofit supporting local artisans, and designed batik textiles and woven products for export. She also created illustrations and educational materials for development and disaster relief projects, including work related to the 2004 Asian Tsunami.
After returning to the U.S., Donna taught with the Village of Arts and Humanities, Mural Arts Philadelphia, and Fleisher Art Memorial, and completed artist residencies with the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Delphi Art Futures and Art Partners programs, Spiral Q, and Rutgers–Camden Center for the Arts. Her honors include First Prize in the American Batik Design Competition (2013), the Leeway Foundation Art & Change Grant (2014), and the NewCourtland Fellowship (2017).
She currently works at SEAMAAC as the Coordinator of Community & Family Wellness serving immigrant & refugee communities in Philadelphia. She also founded and coordinates SEAMAAC’s celebrated resiliency art program. Donna maintains an active studio practice, exhibiting internationally. Her work is included in the Philadelphia Convention Center’s permanent collection, and her public murals can be found in Philadelphia, Camden, New Jersey, and Leeds, England