The MacDowell Colony has awarded 67 artists working in seven disciplines with fellowships for the fall 2016 season. From composer Sebastian Currier (Time Machines, Static), who will work on his next large-scale orchestra piece at MacDowell, to playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins (Gloria, An Octoroon), who expects to work on a radical adaptation of the 15th-century morality play “Everyman,” these artists work in architecture, music composition, film and video, poetry, fiction and non-fiction writing, and visual, interdisciplinary, and theater arts.
These highly competitive fellowships, each with an average value of $10,000, were awarded from among a pool of 574 applications received between February and April 2016. A panel of distinguished professionals in each discipline picks Fellows based solely on their talent, and Fellows are provided a private studio for a period of up to eight weeks, accommodations and three meals a day at one of the nation’s leading contemporary arts programs.
“The projects this group of artists will be working on at MacDowell offer a stunning testament to the wide-ranging subject matter being tackled by today’s greatest talents,” says Executive Director Cheryl A. Young. “From Tayari Jones’s new novel in her Atlanta series, to John Gianvito’s new documentary film, MacDowell artists are producing work that spans a vast array of contemporary themes.”
Fellows are provided uninterrupted time to work, and the unique multidisciplinary exchange artists tell us only a MacDowell residency can provide. Artists demonstrating need are often eligible for travel grants and stipends to cover expenses that accrue at home during a residency. More than 275 MacDowell Colony fellowships are awarded each year. The next application deadline is January 15, 2017 for the summer 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 essential contributions to American and world culture now for more than a century that have to date earned Fellows 77 Pulitzer prizes as well as many other accolades.