Marsha Hatcher Honored with the 2024 Ann McDonald Baker Art Ventures Award

JACKSONVILLE, FL — Marsha Hatcher, a multidisciplinary visual artist who has exhibited her work and helped to build a more vibrant arts community in Northeast Florida for three decades, has been honored with the 2024 Ann McDonald Baker Art Ventures Award.

This year, the award provides a $20,000 unrestricted grant, the largest of its kind in the region. It is bestowed annually in recognition of a gifted local artist whose work brings distinction to Northeast Florida. The award is named for the late Ann McDonald Baker, whose leadership helped create and nurture such vital cultural gems such as The Community Foundation’s Art Ventures Initiative, the Arts Assembly (now the Cultural Council), Douglas Anderson School of the Arts, and Greenscape, among others. Marsha is the tenth winner of the award.

“Our mother’s passion was to make her community a better, more beautiful and caring place,” said Sally Baker Lee, her daughter and chair of the selection committee. Marsha was nominated by Carol Alexander, a trustee at The Community Foundation and member of the award selection committee. “Marsha Hatcher exemplifies this devotion, as do all the recipients of the Ann Baker Art Ventures Award over the last ten years.”

Marsha has traveled the world, and her art, primarily painting, captures these diverse experiences. She has mastered several artistic media including oils, acrylic, wood and metal, and enjoys experimenting with colors and mediums. She has exhibited her work in the Ritz Theatre & Museum, the Beaches Museum and History Park, Yellow House and the Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens, among many others. She learned of the award in the fall at a surprise announcement at the office of The Community Foundation.

“I was elated, I was happy, I was thrilled,” said Hatcher. “My first thought was, ‘Why me?’ I realize I do things for the community that I think are required. If you’re part of the community, you know you have your roles in the community, so I do what I can to lift it up.”

Marsha has lent a strong artistic voice to issues around racial justice. Twice a recipient of an Art Ventures grant, one project awarded was her “Premeditated, Extrajudicial” exhibit at the Museum of Science & History. Helping other artists find their voices, Marsha is an arts educator and a founding, and still active, board member for The Art Center Cooperative. Since 2005, this nonprofit artist collaborative has been staging exhibitions for area artists, providing professional supports, and completing community projects, including several at area schools. Most recently, Marsha has been an instructor of visual arts students at Douglas Anderson School of the Arts.

“Marsha’s work over three decades truly speaks for itself,” said Isaiah M. Oliver, President of The Community Foundation. “Her contributions have made an enduring impact on helping Jacksonville cultivate and retain its talented emerging artists.”