Ora Lerman was born in Campbellsville, Kentucky. Lerman earned a BA at Antioch College and an MFA at Pratt Institute. From 1971 to 1998, she was professor of art at Suffolk Community College. During those years, she maintained active studios in New York City and Laceyville, Pennsylvania, where she had a country home. After her death in 1998, her Laceyville property became part of the Ora Lerman Charitable Trust, and since 2000 the trust has offered summer residencies through the Soaring Gardens Artists Retreat. A dedicated activist for women in the arts, Lerman was one of the founders of the New York chapter of the Women’s Caucus for Art and contributed a number of articles about women artists to ARTS magazine.
She was the recipient of numerous awards, including a Fulbright Fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts Grant Fellowship, and an Andrew Mellon Fellowship. Her work has been exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Prince Street Gallery, New York; the Brooklyn Museum; the Jewish Museum, New York and the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC.
