Nancy Fletcher Cassell was born in Lebanon, Tennessee. Cassell received an

 MFA in Drawing from The University of Cincinnati (1979) and a B.S. from 

Middle Tennessee State University in Painting and Art Education (1970). She studied as a full time student at the Art Academy of Cincinnati (1974-75). 

Early in her career, she worked as a graphic designer in Nashville and was an exhibiting member of The Artist’s Guild. Later, Cassell taught drawing, painting and design at Mount Saint Joseph College, Cincinnati, Ohio (1980-84).

 

Cassell has received two residency fellowships to Yaddo and one to The 

Virginia Center for Creative Arts, as well as grants from Art Matters (1990), The Kentucky Arts Council, Al Smith Fellowship (1987, 1994, 2002), The Southern Arts Federation NEA/Regional Fellowship Program (1988), 

The Kentucky Foundation for Women (1988, 2003) and Summerfair,Individual Artists Grants ( 1987, 1995).

 

Her work is in the permanent collections of The Owensboro Art Museum, 

Owensboro, Kentucky, The Springfield Art Museum, Springfield, Ohio, The

Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, Arkansas The Louisville Courier Journal, 

Cincinnati Bell and numerous public and private collections. She was invited to participate in a video on Kentucky Painters titled “Looking at Painting” for WKET public television. Her work was reproduced in, Drawing Space, Form and Expression, published by Prentice Hall.  Reviews and articles about her work have appeared in Dialogue, Art Papers, The Artists Magazine, The Christian Science Monitor, The New Art Examiner and 

New American Paintings (2007 & 1998).