As I started to pull this column together, I planned to focus on the Claremont MakerSpace restarting its artist-in-residence program.
But combing through email and other events taking place over the next week or so, I kept tripping over other places hosting an artist, some for several days, others for weeks.
In addition to the MakerSpace, Artistree Art Center in South Pomfret, Lebanon Opera House and Dartmouth College’s Department of Studio Art are all hosting artists in a range of disciplines.
What’s of interest to me is the reciprocity of artist-in-residence programs. The venue benefits by offering something out of the ordinary; the artists get time to work on a project while also offering something to the community; and the public gets to experience art, often for free or little cost.
“The program brings in a lot of foot traffic,” Felicia Dalke, executive director of Claremont MakerSpace, or CMS, said in a phone interview. The state grant funding that paid for the program last year dried up when the Republican-controlled state Legislature axed funding for the New Hampshire Council on the Arts.
Dalke reached out to the League of NH Craftsmen (yes, they spell the name with NH in it), and that reverend organization offered funding through its Craft Education Program Enhancement grant. After a winter without a resident artist, applications were open until April 6 and CMS plans to have an artist in place next week through June.
Because there’s no housing component, the artists-in-residence at CMS tend to be from the area around Claremont, Dalke said. And they’re often emerging artists who can both share their expertise with CMS members and pick up new skills during the three-month residency. Artists get studio space and a small stipend.
Larger arts organizations bring in resident artists from farther away.
This week, for example, Lebanon Opera House is hosting Nidia Góngora, a musician from the Pacific coast of Colombia. In addition to a visit to older adults at The Woodlands, a Lebanon assisted living facility, Góngora and her band performed with students at Lebanon High School, played at an assembly at Mount Lebanon School in West Lebanon and held a lecture and demonstration at Windsor’s Old South Church.
The visit culminates at 6:30 Thursday night, April 9, with a free concert at Lebanon Opera House. Registration at lebanonoperahouse.org is recommended, and if you register, you can also make a donation to support the artist residencies. (Góngora’s tour continues with dates in Austin, Texas, New Orleans and London.)
Also Thursday, Dartmouth’s Department of Studio Art hosts Kumi Yamashita, a native of Japan who lives and works in Woodstock, N.Y. She will give a talk about her work in the Hood Museum’s Gilman Auditorium at 4:45, followed by an opening reception in the Hopkins Center’s Jaffe-Friede Gallery.
Artistree’s Grange Theater is hosting a trio of theater artists for the next two weeks. Jordan Elliot performed in a production of A.R. Gurney’s “Sylvia” a year ago and kept in touch with the South Pomfret nonprofit arts center about a future collaboration.
Elliot is working with director Hondo Weiss-Richmond and playwright Becca Schlossberg on “MORE,” in which Elliot plays Ben, a man who starts hearing the voices of his Jewish ancestors after bringing his newborn child home from the hospital.
Elliot and Weiss-Richmond, who live about five minutes from each other in Croton-on-Hudson, north of New York City, worked on the idea together, then co-commissioned Schlossberg.
Together they’ve been “iterating and revising,” Weiss-Richmond said in a phone interview. They’ve generated a 47-page script that runs around 90 minutes. The plan for the two-week residency is to work on the script and what the show would look like onstage, then perform it for audiences on April 17 and 19.
The creative team jumped on the residency offer, Elliot said. It will enable them to work on the stage at Artistree’s Grange Theatre, a step on the journey from page to production. A similar opportunity in New York would cost them tens of thousands of dollars, they said.
“We’ve had a lot of opportunity to connect with the words with this show, and not a real need yet to put it on its feet physically,” Weiss-Richmond said.
“It feels like an opportune moment to share it with people,” he added.
After the two performances, the creative team plans to talk informally with audience members and to give patrons a link to an online survey to fill out.
The aim, in the long run, is to end up with a show that has both durable themes about faith and memory and simple staging requirements, so it can travel to theaters and other venues without fuss.
For audiences, it’s an opportunity to shape a play. “I don’t think audiences get to see something that’s sort of in this middle ground,” Elliot said.
Artistree started the residency program a couple of years ago as a way to connect artists with audiences and to spur the production of new work, Jade Evangelista, theater associate director at Artistree, said.
Comedian Vicki Ferentinos was in residence to develop new stand-up work last year, and also taught a stand-up bootcamp. Her show at the Grange sold out.
“We are so fortunate with what Artistree has built that we can offer a benefit for both parties,” Evangelista said.
“MORE” is in performance at Artistree’s Grange Theatre at 7 p.m. on April 17 and 3 p.m. on April 19. For tickets (pay what you wish with a $10 minimum) and more information, go to artistreevt.org.
Opening reception
Four new exhibitions open Friday at AVA Gallery and Art Center in Lebanon with a reception from 5 to 7 p.m. The new shows feature work by Jackie Brown, Steve Budington, Tom Ferrara, and Maxwell Holden that spans a range of genres from painting to ceramics. The shows are up through May 23.
There are a few extra opportunities for engagement with these shows. A viewer can book a time to have tea with Maxwell Holden, a ceramicist, on April 11 and 25, and May 2 and 16 (go to avagallery.org).
And Tom Ferrara, who teaches studio art at Dartmouth, will talk about his work at 5:30 on April 17.
