I've spent the last month at the Vermont Studio Center, an artist-run residency program, and it's been great. This was my first residency so I wasn't totally sure what to expect, but I shouldn't have worried: great food and facilities, beautiful scenery, and brilliant people both in residence and on staff. In some ways it was pretty much like a mini-intensive grad school without all the stress (also minus the CTA and Jewel-Osco), and I amazed myself by drawing. Yes. Also making lists that go nowhere, which I'm much more accustomed to, and other components of a healthy practice (soccer and karaoke).
VSC's facilities are divided more or less by dimension---making three-dimensional work I had a great studio, spacious and with access to a kiln and an amazing wood and metal shop. Though I wasn't working with metal exactly, I did take the opportunity to start making some of my own tools, real profesh (actually, having them very helpfully made for me---thanks Harlan and Nick!).
Which brings me, of course, to the most important part: my amazing friends, colleagues, and collaborators. The pop-up show KEGGER, which Guadalupe Martinez, Erica Scourti, and I put together was great, and I look forward to future collaborations with these two incredibly talented artists as well as many others. A few samples for you--work by, from left, Mathew Zefeldt, Layet Johnson, and Miho Tajima:
This program partially supported by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.