Patrick Earl Hammie is an American visual artist—painter, draftsman, sculptor, and illustrator—and educator, who specializes in portraiture, cultural identity, storytelling, and the body in visual culture. Hammie’s projects, interdisciplinary collaborations, and commissions examine personal and shared Black experiences, and offer stories that expand our understanding of others. His projects draw inspiration from Romanticism and Expressionism, mythology, pop culture, and modern media. The synthesis of these diverse expressions invites viewers to consider the tales we tell and how we express notions of self, community, and others today.

Hammie was born in 1981 in New Haven, CT, and is now based in Champaign, IL. He studied drawing at Coker University (2004) and received an MFA in painting from University of Connecticut (2008). Much of Hammie’s education was in the Liberal Arts, including music, education, and dance. Hammie is currently an Associate Professor and Chair of Studio Arts at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Hammie’s works have been exhibited in Germany, India, South Africa, and the United States, at venues that span the California African American Museum, The Drawing Center, John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Kunstwerk Carlshütte, National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, Wausau Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Zhou B. Art Center. He was an artist-in-residence at the John Michael Kohler Art Center and the first recipient of the Alice C. Cole ’42 Fellowship from Wellesley College. His works are included in public and private collections including the David C. Driskell Center (Maryland), Kinsey Institute Collections (Indiana), Kohler Company Collection (Wisconsin), JPMorgan Chase Art Collection (New York), and William Benton Museum of Art (Connecticut). He has been supported by fellowships and grants from the Joyce Foundation, Midwestern Voices and Visions, Puffin Foundation, Tanne Foundation, the States of Illinois and Connecticut, and other private foundations.