Poetry & Collage Residency 2024
A four-week, virtual/online residency with Kolaj Institute in May 2024
Early deadline to apply: Sunday, 7 April 2024
Final deadline to apply: Sunday, 21 April 2024
Submit your application HERE
In January 2022, Kolaj Institute issued a call to artists for a Poetry & Collage Residency and received so many excellent responses that we organized a series of three residencies. In the residencies, we challenged artists to move beyond taxonomical debates. Ric Kasini Kadour said, “What is a poem? We do not need to have a singular answer to that question. Individually we must each answer that question for ourselves. In practice, every poem we make will be an example of what a poem is. In considering other people’s work, we should ask ourselves, How is this a poem?” During the residencies, artists interrogated each other’s artwork, collaborated, and shared ideas. And at the end of it, they sent us more page spreads than could fit into a single book. Impressed and moved by the volume and quality of cultural output and a deep belief that this practice, however you want to describe it, at the intersection of collage and poetry deserves a platform, we decided to create a new journal dedicated to it.
PoetryXCollage is a printed journal of artwork and writing that operates at the intersection of poetry and collage. We are interested in found poetry, blackout poetry, collage poems, haikus, centos, response collages, response poems, word scrambles, concrete poetry, scatter collage poems, and other poems and artwork that inhabit this world.
After releasing several volumes of the journal and opening an ongoing call for submissions, we are returning to this residency program as a way to help artists develop their ideas, explore the intersection of collage and poetry, collaborate and form community, and prepare submissions for the journal. This project-driven residency is open to artists and poets.
Kolaj Institute Coordinator, Christopher Kurts will co-lead the residency with artist, poet, and writer, Jennifer Roche. Together they will guide artists in collaborative activities, research and discussion, and understanding the technical needs of design and layout necessary to submit page spreads to the PoetryXCollage Journal. Ric Kasini Kadour will talk about artist practice, the book as a place for collage, and how Kolaj Institute works to diffuse collage and poetry. Rod T. Boyer creates art and poetry under the moniker our thomas, exploring themes of redemption, mystery, and transformation. In Kolaj #32, his article, “Mind the Gap,” explored how collage and haiku share similar mechanisms of juxtaposition and disjunction. He will speak to these themes during the residency.
In four virtual meetings over the course of the month (see schedule below) and through ongoing, online discussion, artists will leave the residency with a deeper understanding of the intersection of collage and poetry. Individual participants will each be invited to create and submit 3-5 page spreads to the PoetryXCollage Journal.
WHO IS THIS FOR?
Collage Artist Residencies are intended for self-motivated artists, at any stage in their career, who want to develop their practice by exploring a topic or working method and collaborating with others to produce a final product. Residencies are open to any artist over the age of 21 from anywhere in the world.
COST
The cost of the residency is $500 per artist. Limited financial aid is available to offset the residency fee. Organizers will support artists as they seek additional funding as needed.
HOW TO APPLY
Submit your application HERE.
RESIDENCY LOGISTICS
Dates: 1-30 May 2024
SESSION DATES
Thursday, 2 May 2024, 4-6PM EDT
Thursday, 9 May 2024, 4-6PM EDT
Thursday, 23 May 2024, 4-6PM EDT
Thursday, 30 May 2024, 4-6PM EDT
The workshop will begin with an invitation to join the Slack workspace on Wednesday, May 1st. Introductions and Orientation will take place during our first meeting on Thursday, 2 May, 4-6PM EDT.
The remaining sessions will take place on 9, 23, and 30 May, from 4-6PM EDT. After the final session, artists will be invited to submit page spreads to the PoetryXCollage Journal.
Artists are expected to attend all scheduled sessions and complete assignments.
APPLICATION PROCESS
The submission process asks applicants for:
• Contact information
• Artist Bio (50-250 words)
• Statement of Artist Practice (50-300 words)
• 5-7 images of artwork
• Statement of expectations
• Asks questions about your work and needs
QUESTIONS
If you have questions, send an email.
FACULTY
Christopher Kurts is a storyteller, artist, and the Coordinator for Kolaj Institute. Kurts is also the co-founder and lead organizer of The Mystic Krewe of Scissors and Glue, a group of creatives in New Orleans who meet monthly to collage, converse, and foster community. His work appeared in “The Heart of a Dark Universe”, at Bar Redux; and “Unfamiliar Vegetables”, a group show and book Kurts helped organize for Kolaj Fest New Orleans at Artisan Bar & Cafe in Summer 2019. In the fall of 2019, Kurts curated, “The Lifting of the Veil: The Optimist’s Apocalypse”, a group show. He was the art director for the collage illustrated edition of Oh, Money! Money! by Eleanor H. Porter, published by Kolaj Institute and Maison Kasini. His art was also featured in issue #4 of Loner Magazine. www.christopherkurts.com
Jennifer Roche is a Chicago-based poet, writer, and collage artist whose work is fundamentally interested in upholding nature and humanity. Her book of poems, 20, (Alternating Current Press), was erased from Jules Verne’s epic 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and her chapbook, “The Synonym Tables,” (The Poetry Question) contains Pushcart Prize-nominated works that contrast synonyms from 1947 for words, such as wealth, poverty, and race, with synonyms for the same words from 2021. Roche’s analog collages explore humanity through portraits created from eclectic paper sources, documents, and ephemera. Her “Ikea Series” placed portraits of people and animals within the ubiquitous interiors of the final edition of the print catalog to examine the cultural impact of the global distribution of identical furnishings. Her artwork appears in PoetryXCollage, Volume 1, and her collage, & God said, was exhibited in Woman Made Gallery’s “Roe 2.0” juried exhibit in early 2023. She facilitates the monthly meeting of the PXC Collage Cohort, which grew out of the original Kolaj Institute Poetry & Collage Residency, and her interview with Ukrainian collage artists about their record-breaking exhibit in Kyiv last year is forthcoming in Kolaj Magazine. www.jenniferrocheus.com
Ric Kasini Kadour, a 2021 recipient of a Curatorial Fellowship from The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, is a writer, artist, publisher, and cultural worker. With the Vermont Arts Council, he curated “Connection: The Art of Coming Together” (2017) and Vermont Artists to Watch (2018, 2019, 2020). In New Orleans (2018-2019), he curated “Revolutionary Paths” at Antenna Gallery and “Cultural Deconstructions” at LeMieux Galleries. As Curator of Contemporary Art at Rokeby Museum in Ferrisburgh, Vermont (2019-2020), he curated “Rokeby Through the Lens”, “Structures”, and “Mending Fences: New Works by Carol MacDonald”. At the Southern Vermont Arts Center (2019), he curated “Contemporary American Regionalism: Vermont Perspectives” and “Where the Sun Casts No Shadow: Postcards from the Creative Crossroads of Quito, Ecuador”. With Frank Juarez, he co-curated “The Money $how: Cash, Labor, Capitalism & Collage” at Saint Kate-The Arts Hotel in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (April-September 2021). Kadour is editor and publisher of Kolaj Magazine. His writing has appeared in Hyperallergic, OEI, Vermont Magazine, Seven Days, and Art New England (where he was the Vermont editor). In Winter 2020, he was artist-in-residence at MERZ Gallery in Sanquhar, Scotland. He holds a BA in Comparative Religion from the University of Vermont. www.rickasinikadour.com
Rod T. Boyer creates art and poetry as our thomas, exploring themes of redemption, mystery, and transformation. Like the rest of the world, he’s trying to make sense of the endless and overwhelming stream of flotsam (physical and metaphoric) that accompanies his life. His collage work has been exhibited in his local area and his haiku have recently appeared in the journals Modern Haiku, Acorn, is/let, Sonic Boom, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper, Trash Panda, and Failed Haiku among others. He was named a finalist in the first annual Trailblazer Contest and has had work selected for The Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku, 2021. He can be found wandering the streets in Exeter, New Hampshire, USA. www.ourthomasart.com