Toni Nash

A multidisciplinary artist, Toni Nash is a native New Yorker who began her media career in radio. For the past 40+ years, she has made the Philadelphia area her home. Many of you may remember Toni from her Emmy nominated talk show, “Profiles” which aired on Channel 57 for 10 years. In her capacity as host and producer of Profiles, Toni interviewed over 2,000 people, groups, and organizations. Her interviews included governors, celebrities, local movers and shakers, but her main focus was on everyday people making a difference and showcasing those in the arts. During the 5th year of Profiles, Nash invited WHYY host Bob Perkins to join her for a series of shows called the BT (Bob & Toni) Jazz Express. A one of a kind program featuring local jazz artists from the tri-state area. 

As the station's public-affairs director, Nash was also instrumental in bringing an exhibition on the life and works of author Zora Neale Hurston to the Free Library of Philadelphia in 1990.

Following the close of the show, Nash joined the staff of the Fairmount Park Commission where she headed up the 2000 Centennial Celebration She also served as the Vice President of the American Women’s Heritage Society which runs the Belmont Mansion and the Underground Railroad Museum.

During all this time, Nash found that her love of images, textures, and colors, provided a constant challenge of which direction to follow artistically.  When she found the Philadelphia based group known as the “Dumpster Divers,” an internationally recognized group of fellow artists who specialize in designing art from “found objects,” she found a home for her ideas. Says Nash, “There is no more satisfying experience than to finish a piece that began with some odd piece of wood, metal, plexiglass, keys, and other ephemera. Junk, in some people’s eyes, but you know how that goes, “One woman’s trash is…!”. A confirmed shutterbug as well, Toni loves the joy of capturing those candid moments that can be lost in the blink of an eye. Her photographs were featured as part of the Scribe Video photography exhibition, “A Philadelphia Through New Eyes”.

Toni is the recipient of numerous awards and citations, including a national Peace Core recognition and the Philadelphia Human Relations Committee Humanitarian Award.  She is honored to be the recipient of the 2020 Leeway Transformation grant. Post pandemic she is looking forward to finishing working on a documentary on Philadelphia painter Andrew Turner and continuing her journey in the art world.