Antionette "Toni" S. Hodges

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Antionette Simmons Hodges, also know as ASH, is a native of Buffalo, NY, but has resided in Silver Spring, MD since 1969. She received her B. S. in Education at West Virginia State College ( now University ), and M. A. in Education at Trinity College in Washington, D. C. Her teaching career includes thirty years as an elementary art teacher with District of Columbia Public Schools, and a year of teaching part time middle school art at Sandy Spring School in Olney, MD. Just before retirement in 1999, Antionette's professional artist career began at Trinity College, with a one women show entitled "Yesteryears." Many of the images from the Trinity exhibit, were used by Ethnographics Card Company as greeting cards 1996 - 2001.  

I feel that my paintings show a celebration of African-American life from the past and the present. It is my intent to stimulate the emotions of my viewer, whether it be dancers, musicians, children, or a lady in a hat. Music has played an important role in my work, as a subject and inspiration. In November 2006, applause at Strathmore Magazine featured her painting," Music by Moonlight" as a cover. In 2014," Feelin' The Rhythm" became cover art for Harlem Blues, a book written and published in France by Christine Duale' and L' Harmattan publishers. Antionette received The D. C. Commission of Arts and Humanities grant in 2016. In 2018, her painting "Dreams Deferred" was purchased by Martha's Table, a non-profit charity organization for their permanent art collection in their new building in S.E. Washington.

Antionette has participated in many juried and group exhibitions in the Washington D.C. area, as well as in Iowa, West Virginia, New York, California, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and U.S Virgin Island.