SC Arts Commision Grants Awards

Jonathan Brilliant

Jonathan Brilliant holds a Bachelor of Arts in Studio Art from the College of Charleston and a Master of Fine Arts in Spatial Arts from San Jose State University. He has served as a visiting artist and artist-in-residence for numerous communities, schools and universities, including the Ox-Bow School of Art, the Penland School of Crafts, Redux Contemporary Art Center, University of Oklahoma, University of Memphis, and recently for the East/West Project in Berlin, Germany.

In 2007, Brilliant was awarded a Joan Mitchell Foundation fellowship to attend the Vermont Studio Center. In 2009 he received the juror’s award at the National Outdoor Sculpture Exhibition and was named a South Carolina Arts Commission Visual Arts Fellow alternate. Brilliant creates compositional elements by weaving, welding and stacking various mediums, including such re-purposed coffee shop items as stirrers, lids and cups.

From May 2009 - December 2010 he conducted his “Have Sticks Will Travel World Tour,” a series of site-specific installations in 13 galleries on two continents. In September 2010, Brilliant was named the winner of the Columbia Design League’s inaugural “Play With Your City” public art competition. In addition to site-specific installations, Brilliant works with drawing, sculpture and photography and lectures at universities across the country.