Artists’ residencies and workshops have been some of the most meaningful opportunities afforded me as a writer, providing an intensive experience of place and an occasion to respond as an artist for a local audience. As well, they offer the opportunity of unfettered time to spend writing, thinking, and exploring as well as the possibility of camaraderie with other artists and writers and people from the community.
I have highlighted three residencies, in Spain, England and Morocco, but my participation in other programs have had a profound effect upon my writing:
The Center for Book Arts, in New York City, offers a Letterpress Printing and Fine Press Publishing Seminar for Emerging Writers, that deepened my long-time interest in the relationship between image and word. To apply and for more information: https://centerforbookarts.org
I was pleased to gain acceptance into two NEH workshops for community college teachers. Each provided me with valuable content and context: African-American History and Culture in the Georgia Low Country: Savannah and the Coastal Islands and Black Mountain College: An Artistic and Educational Legacy, Asheville, North Carolina. https://www.neh.gov/divisions/education/summer-programs
The time spent at Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, Vermont, and the Atlantic Center for the Arts, New Smyrna Beach, Florida, led to new projects. In addition to inspiration, the Summer Literary Seminars (with Ed Hirsch) in Vilnius, Lithuania, led to an important friendship (as with many of the residencies), and the discovery of family roots in Lodz, Poland.
