2022 - Manifest Residency
Artist in Residency Award / July 2021 - July 2022 / Manifest Creative Research Gallery and Drawing Center, Cincinnati, OH
I applied for the MAR in conjunction with my first sabbatical leave from the University of Wyoming after two years of delays and cancelled plans due to the pandemic. It was a program I wanted to be a part of since its inception, and I was finally able to commit to the full year because of the remote teaching opportunities that were, somewhat ironically, also made possible by the pandemic. I lived in an apartment about a block from the Gallery’s MAR studio, and I worked in the space nearly every day, resolving at least twelve new large-scale works. At the Drawing Center, I participated in open figure drawing sessions most weeks, and I taught a three-part series of classes on portraiture to some very dedicated students in the community. I was accepted into three juried exhibitions in addition to my solo show at Manifest Gallery this season while participating in at least fourteen total exhibitions nationally during the residency. I was a visiting artist at Northern Kentucky University and Ohio University, where after twenty years I finally reconnected with my freshman year drawing professor in addition to meeting with some former students from Wyoming seeking their MFAs there. Upon reflection, I believe I did my best to live up to the high standards for quality in creative research set by Manifest by taking full advantage of the opportunities the program provided.