Biographical Sketch
Jennifer Hecker has an extensive and diverse exhibition record that includes solo exhibits, commissions, collaborative installations, public art projects, outdoor sculpture displays, adjudicated exhibitions, and permanent collections. Jennifer recently (2022) completed a month-long residency at the Triangle L Art Ranch in Oracle, Arizona where she had a solo exhibition and collaborated with the Triangle L director, Sharon Holnback, on “Rain Dreamscape” —a site-specific, large scale, outdoor installation for permanent display in the sculpture park. Jennifer’s work has won awards in several recent exhibitions, including: 1st Place in the nationally adjudicated “Momentum” exhibition in Toledo, Ohio (2017); 2nd Place award in the nationally adjudicated “Hot Glass” exhibition in Cumberland, Maryland (2017); CITY Newspaper’s “Critic’s Pick Award” in the Rochester Contemporary Members’ Exhibition (2016); and 1st Place in the adjudicated, regional sculpture exhibition “After the Pedestal” at The Sculpture Center in Cleveland, Ohio (2015). In 2016, a solo exhibition of her mixed media sculptures was exhibited in the Main Gallery of the Turchin Center for the Visual Arts in Boone, NC. Just 15 months later, Jennifer had a solo exhibition in the Roz Steiner Gallery at Genesee Community College in Batavia, NY with 11 new sculptures. Her work has been included in thematic exhibitions on water at: AnnMarie Sculpture Garden and Art Center in Solomons, MD; Allegheny College in Meadville, PA; the Schweinfurth Art Center in Auburn, NY; and the State Street Gallery in Chicago, IL. In 2013, Jennifer was one of 42 regional artists invited to create a new work inspired by an artwork in the permanent collection of the Memorial Art Gallery in Rochester, NY in celebration of its centennial. In 2011, Jennifer was one of 30 artists from around the world to be featured in the book Sculpture and Design with Recycled Glass by Cindy Ann Coldiron (Schiffer Publishing). In 2006, her commissioned outdoor sculpture for the Village of Brockport, Les Racines et les Raisons (The Roots and the Reasons) was dedicated in Remembrance Park. In 2004, she completed a significant commission for a three-part, site-specific sculpture for Christ Church in Pittsford, New York.
Jennifer has been the recipient of awards from the Jerome Foundation, the Arts and CulturalvCouncil of Greater Rochester, the United University Professions and SUNY College at Brockport. Her work is included in the permanent collections of ProMedica Corporate Headquarters in Toledo, OH; The Red Cross in Rochester, NY; The Children’s Inn at the National Institute of Health in Bethesda, MD, and SUNY College at Brockport, as well as private collections in New York, North Carolina, Arizona, Colorado, Virginia, Kansas, Ohio, Illinois, Florida, Michigan, and Minnesota.
Jennifer is a professor in the Department of Art at SUNY College at Brockport, where she has taught all levels of sculpture as well as general education art courses since 1989. In 1999, she was awarded a Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching, and in 2002 she completed a 6- year term as department chairperson.