84 Artists Awarded MacDowell Fellowships for Summer Residencies

The MacDowell Colony has awarded fellowships to 84 artists from 18 states and six countries, from Colorado to Virginia and from Portugal to Nigeria. They are working in seven disciplines, and 43 percent identify as culturally diverse while 56 percent are women. The fellowships are for upcoming summer residencies at one of the nation's leading contemporary arts organizations.

The incoming group of MacDowell Fellows includes 2018 Pulitzer Prize-winning author Andrew Sean Greer, poet Monica Youn, composers Mark Dresser, Laura Schwendinger, and Kate Soper, performance artist John Kelly, playwrights Brian Selznick and Rebecca Taichman, filmmakers João Rui Guerra da Mata and João Pedro Rodrigues, and visual artists Nayland Blake, Tod Lippy, and Mary Lum.

These highly competitive fellowships, each with an average value of $10,000, were awarded from a pool of 978 applications received between October 2017 and January 2018. A panel of distinguished professionals in each discipline selects Fellows based solely on their talent as evidenced by a work sample and project description. While at MacDowell Fellows are provided a private studio for a period of up to eight weeks, accommodations, and three meals a day.

"Time and again artists have told us a MacDowell residency provides the clarity of mind needed to make art. The pull of distractions and the frenetic pace of everyday life make that kind of focus difficult," says Executive Director Cheryl A. Young. "This group of artists will have the advantage of the long summer days as well as a chance to meet some great artists in other disciplines. A long walk to the studio or in impromptu conversation can lead to discoveries that might not otherwise come to be. You can hear their excitement when they get the news of the fellowship. They can't wait to dig into new work."

The most recent group of Fellows includes, according to discipline:

Architects Zaneta Hong, Anthony Morey, Bryony Roberts, Maxi Spina, Hans Tursack, and Andrew Witt.

Composers Ingrid Arauco, Mark Dresser, Michael Fiday, Mikel Kuehn, Grace McLean, Laura Schwendinger, and Kate Soper.

Filmmakers Cecilia Aldarondo, Zia Anger, Kanu Behl, João Rui Guerra da Mata, Christopher Harris, Jenni Olson, João Pedro Rodrigues, Jonathan Schwartz, Fern Silva, J.P. Sniadecki, Julia Solomonoff, Brett Story, and Jennifer Taylor.

Interdisciplinary Artists Carmina Escobar, John Kelly, and Helina Metaferia.

Theatre Artists Rinde Eckert, Morgan Gould, Blake Hackler, Sukari Jones, Cordelia Lynn, Ellen McLaughlin, Brian Selznick, Rebecca Taichman, and James Tyler.

Visual Artists Nayland Blake, Julia Bland, Dawn Clements, Liz Collins, Adriana Farmiga, Annette Lawrence, Tod Lippy, Mary Lum, Tanya Marcuse, Kambui Olujimi, Clifford Owens, and Michael Stamm.

Poets Dexter Booth, Jesús Castillo, Eduardo Corral, Peter Gizzi, Solmaz Sharif, Kara Wang, and Monica Youn.

Nonfiction Writers Philip Clark, Katrina Dodson, Wil Hylton, David Johnson, Pamela Newkirk, Ricardo Nuila, Mimi Pond, Lauren Sandler, Jia Tolentino, Jenna Wortham, and Joshua Yaffa.

Fiction Writers Ayobami Adebayo, Lesley Arimah, Kali Fajardo-Anstine, Andrew Greer, Stephen Kuusisto, Magogodi Makhene, Marina Petrova, Jayne Anne Phillips, Nell Stevens, João Tordo, LaToya Watkins, David Weiden, Sophia Whiteley Yanow, Eley Williams, and Jung H Yun.

Fellows make use of uninterrupted time to work and enjoy the rare opportunity for multidisciplinary exchange. Artists with demonstrated financial need are eligible for travel grants and stipends to cover expenses that accrue at home during a residency. The MacDowell Colony awards more than 300 fellowships each year. The next application deadline is Sept. 15, 2018 for the winter-spring 2019 residency period.

By awarding these fellowships, The MacDowell Colony continues its long-standing mission to nurture the arts by offering creative individuals of the highest talent an inspiring environment in which they can produce enduring works of the imagination. It is a mission that has inspired important contributions to American and world culture for more than a century, and have to date earned Fellows 85 Pulitzer prizes as well as many other accolades.

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