About Us
Boardmembers
- Ellie Balk
- Kennis Baptiste
- Natasha Harsh, Secretary
- Kathleen Hayek, President
- Wendy Jones
- Melissa Lee, Treasurer
- William McMillian
- GG Stankiewicz
- Valerie Williams
Contact
Office address:
SONYA
305 Vanderbilt Ave
Brooklyn, NY 11205
Mailing address:
South Of the Navy Yard Artists
P.O. Box 381082
Brooklyn, NY 11238
email: info@sonyaonline.org
phone: 718-705-4921
Directions
Bet. Lafayette Ave. & Dekalb Ave.
C or G train to Clinton Washington.
B69, B38 buses
Hours
by appointment: 718-705-4921
Members Application &
SONYA Events Registration
SONYA
South Of the Navy Yard Artists, (SONYA) is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization of visual artists living, creating, and/or exhibiting in the Ft. Greene, Clinton Hill, Wallabout, and Bedford Stuyvesant neighborhoods of Brooklyn. We are as diverse and dynamic as the community we serve. Our geographic boundaries are Flushing Ave. on the north (including the Navy Yard), Bedford Ave on the east, Atlantic Ave. on the south and Flatbush Ave. on the west.
Mission
In the belief that art and community nurture each other, our mission is to recognize, support, and celebrate the visual arts and artists within our community by bringing people together in an environment that encourages exploration, dialogue and enjoyment of the visual arts.
History
South Of the Navy Yard Artists, (SONYA) was founded in 1999 by three local artists, Kathleen Hayek, D. Lammie Hanson, and GG Stankiewicz. We maintain an artist membership of 75 to 100 local visual artists.
SONYA offers several exhibitions, studio tours, education events and public programs, open to the public each year. We are an active participant in our community, partnering with other local community groups to present group exhibitions at local venues such as: Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Artisan Market, Goloborotko’s Studio, Corridor Gallery, the Robert Lehman Gallery at UrbanGlass, ART/NY, Fort Greene Association, Myrtle Ave Revitaliztion Project, (MARP), Fulton Area Businesses (FAB) and Pratt Area Community Council (PACC).
The membership of SONYA, 60% women, 40% men, 50% mid-career, reflects the multi-racial and cross-generational constituency of the communities it serves. In response to the need for a local venue to exhibit our work, SONYA began with 19 members and what was to become an annual event, the Studio Stroll, on every 3rd weekend of May. To date SONYA has grown to over seventy members, many of whom open their creative spaces to visitors every year on Stroll weekend.
In 2000, we established our website, www.sonyaonline.org, allowing visitors to review Brooklyn-based artists' work and contact them directly. In 2004, SONYA opened a home office and gallery, ElevenTen Gallery, through which we offered solo and small group exhibitions with a community focus, artist-run workshops, and communal meeting space. In 2006, the Curators Tour was added to the annual Studio Stroll to offer prominent art curators and collectors a private preview of artists' studios and work. In December 2007, we launched our Friends of SONYA campaign offering membership benefits to art collectors and curators. In February of 2009, we moved back to our original headquarters at 305 Vanderbilt Ave. focusing our limited budget on building our social media contacts.
With the recent expansion of our board of directors from 3 to 9 members, SONYA plans to offer more collaborative community-based programming year round and begin a capital fundraising campaign to establish a permanent home for our office, educational programs, and exhibitions.