September 2025

The importance of artist residencies to my studio practice.

When I participated in my first residency at the Archie Bray Foundation, where I was a guest artist in the VouIkos studio and lived in the “chicken house,” I never imagined that residencies would become such a vital part of my practice. As anyone familiar with the Bray knows, it was a great honor for me to spend time there. I was thrilled and intimidated and worked 24/7 to prove my worth. Besides learning about soda firing,  I learned that something was missing in my studio practice— I was missing conversation and regular feedback from other artists. Initially, I had looked for residencies where I could explore a technique that wasn’t available to me in my own studio, but now, with knowledge gleaned from a wide variety of residencies, I look for two features:  A place that affords me the freedom from the expectations that I impose on myself in my own space, and a place that supports enriching, maybe challenging conversations with artists from around the world- at a shared dinner table. 

This year, I had two such opportunities and both proved enriching in very different ways. I spent spring in northern Italy at the Woodman Foundation Residency, in a small community in the hills southeast of Florence—which sounds oh so fabulous, and it was, and of course, wasn’t always. The residency is in the former home and studio of artists George and Betty Woodman. Betty was one of the great innovators in ceramics, her solo show at the Met in NYC was eye opening and ambitious and set a precedent for artists working in clay at a major museum. The residency is classically Tuscan, an old stone farmhouse, blooming wisteria, plum trees moving from flowering to setting fruit, olive trees leafing out, very busy bees, a gurgling stream. The home is filled with Betty’s ceramics, George’s paintings and photographs, and the work of artist friends. The studio, Betty’s former studio, was everything an artist could want, great light, huge wall space, worktables, a Blau kiln, materials ready to use, a good clay body, and views over historic olive groves. I worked both in the studio, influenced by Betty’s tradition of deconstructed vessels and George’s photographs, and out in the woods and olive groves, continuing my relationships with trees, and exploring age, grief, and resilience. It was not an easy time, I regularly felt very challenged by the emotions that I was working from and I usually felt like the work wasn’t going well. In Betty’s studio I made a series of sculpted and painted portraits of trees, the bent branches of the ancient olive grove around me made me think a lot about the body in which I am living, which is really showing the years. I have lived a very physical life as a sculptor-I have been a strong person and it has been interesting and sad to note a decline in my strength and a shifting of my abilities. I still feel fortunate to be able to be in this body, and as kindred souls, I emulated the olive trees, many of which were splitting and gnarled, yet were growing and producing olives. Additionally, I worked on a series of performances in the olive grove about birth and a connection with the environment. I’m not sure if the work really went anywhere, but it was definitely part of the process I needed to pursue. The other major project that I developed was a collection of sculptural forms that trees limbs which I wore on my body like prosthetics. These pieces are documented with photography and video, and they are a little challenging for me to look at, but it is exciting and nervy to take chances and to do work that you’re not sure about. I don’t expect to show the work, but I’m proud of myself for having been brave enough to pursue it thoroughly. Residencies do offer time and freedom.  The final series that I worked on was inspired by George Woodman‘s series of classically informed portraits he started after the tragic death of their daughter Francesca Woodman, a noted photographer. In response, I made an amphora form and did a series of self portraits with the vessel, the vessel as body, the body as vessel. it’s the beginning of a series that I will pursue when I return to Arizona

I pushed myself every day, I took chances and now that I review the work, I find some of it haunting and beautiful and scary too. I could not have accomplished that work at home. 

The Woodman residency also provided those dinner table conversations: for most of the residency, I was in the company of other artists, all working in different disciplines, but our work united by an interest in nature and post humanism. Our conversations were focused on an artist’s responsibility towards the environment and the future. I often felt like I was barely keeping up with the discussions.  So I read more to be better prepared. During the residency I read Jane Bennet’s brilliant book, Vibrant Matter, and additional essays about new materialism. l really made me think deeply about my responsibilities as a human and my desire, yearning, to communicate with the natural world. I recognize the vitality in individuality and vibrancy of everything around me–the olive grove and the flowering plants as well as the rocks in the stream. 

I will present a selection of this work at September’s open studio.

FINLAND

The idea that all people need time and space to be creative is broadly accepted and I have really found that to be true. In Phoenix, I have a beautiful studio and I am very productive, but the time that I spend at residencies is of a different sort, the days are long, especially  in Finland, where the sun never set during my month there and because  time is devoted to making art, there’s a fluidity between working in the studio or doing some sketching outside,  or maybe sitting at my laptop and really figuring out  my new editing software, or spending time researching rock quarries in Finland… and sitting in a rocking chair reading. I don’t know why, but I don’t use time so fluidly in Arizona. But it is time so well spent.

July in Finland! I was in the northern part of the country, close to the coast and on the river Ii.  Because my work has become so dependent upon site specific environmental situations, I chose this residency so I could return to the boreal forest, and I hoped for a place where I could explore remote parts of the natural world and develop a better understanding of my own experience in these places in the far north—I feel very much at home in the north and am curious why this is true. 

I wrote this one evening when it was about 11 pm. Because it was the middle of summer, the days go on and it never gets dark. You could say it’s dim between 2:30 and 3:30 AM but not dark. There is always a glow.
This is definitely impacted my sleeping and it’s hard to even schedule a day because you just feel like going all the time. This residency is located on a river of lovely wide slow-moving river, and the residency has a little dock from which I took a swim many evenings. Many evenings, at 10:30 or 11, neighborhood kids with their floaties jump into the river, it’s light out and it’s summer. I don’t know when they sleep. Maybe they don’t need sleep but the days are just so extended in a way. My body never quite adjusted.

At Kulttuuri Kauppila my fellow artist was a dancer from Greece. She was awarded a commission by the E 75 project which is a European performance project featuring performing artists from throughout Europe, whose countries are linked by the highway. The E75 goes all the way from the very, very top of Norway down to Greece. My new friend Polena is a community-oriented choreographer and dancer, and part of a project called mind-body-muscle-bone. Her storytelling through her work was inspiring, and we were able to provide valuable feedback to each other.

This residency became a place where different threads of my interest came together and I am so excited about the work. It was challenging but didn’t leave me with the feeling of frustration and failure that so many of my days in Italy ended with. I learned about deep listening in new ways and practiced a more active embodied performance. A lot of bits and pieces, research and reading came together in an unusual landscape. I know it has helped me grow. I could tell you about the work, but I would rather show you!

May I suggest that if you’re an artist and you’re reading this and you haven’t done a residency, I hope that you will apply for one. There are so many options, and you can go for a couple weeks or even up to a year. Some come with funding and stipends, others you pay for, if anyone has any questions about residencies in general I’d be happy to chat with you. I’ve learned a little bit about what works for me, which wouldn’t necessarily work for you, but I have gone through a learning process that I am happy to share.