OSGF Announces Summer and Fall 2020 Artists in Residence

The Oak Spring Garden Foundation is thrilled to announce our Summer and Fall 2020 Artists in Residence. 

The fourteen awardees are writers, filmmakers and visual artists working in a multitude of disciplines. Each cohort of eight artists will spend six weeks at Oak Spring this summer and fall, using the foundation’s resources, including the wealth of material housed in the Oak Spring Garden Library, to work on a range of unique projects related to the natural world. 

In addition to receiving a $1,500 individual grant, the awardees will be provided with housing accommodation during their residencies at OSGF. We will announce a call for 2021 Residency Programs in late March, so keep an eye on our website and social media channels.

Scroll through the slideshow below to learn more about each artist.

(Cover image: artist Autumn Von Plinksy working during her 2019 residency.)

Summer 2020 Artists in Residence

Aimee Lee

Aimee Lee is an artist and writer who practices sculpture, installation, and fiber arts. She is the author of Hanji Unfurled: One Journey into Korean Papermaking and the founder of the first hanji studio in North America. Aimee is currently based in Cleveland, OH. Read more about her at www.aimeelee.net.

Amie Whittemore

Amie Whittemore is a poet whose work explores issues of place, gender, and sexuality, and the author of Glass Harvest. Amie is currently based in Murfreesboro, TN, where she is a lecturer at Middle Tennessee State University. Read more about her at www.amiewhittemore.com.

Benjamin Heller

Benjamin Heller is a cross-disciplinary artist whose work blends elements of installation, photography, sculpture, and theater arts. His site-specific sculptures and other work has been performed, exhibited and installed throughout the U.S.  He is currently based in Brooklyn, NY. Learn more about him at www.benjaminhellerart.com.

Calista Lyon

Calista Lyon is an artist who works in film, installation, photography, sculpture, theater arts, and writing/prose. A native of Australia based in Columbus, Ohio, she is currently working on a multi- year, multi-disciplinary project centered on an Australian native orchid collection created by an individual from her family’s farming community. Learn more about her at www.calistalyon.com.

James Jack

James Jack is an artist and an assistant professor of Art Practice at Yale-NUS College in Singapore, who is “concerned with rejuvenating stories that exist in the world.” His work has been exhibited and published in Asia and the U.S. Learn more about him at www.jamesjack.org.

Kaitlin Bryson

Kaitlin Bryson is an artist and ecologist whose disciplines include drawing, fiber arts, installation, landscape design, and sculpture. She comes from a biodynamic and permaculture farming background that inspires her “restorative, earth-based practices.” Her current work examines interactions between fungi and heavy metals. She is based in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Learn more about her at www.kaitlinbryson.com.

Madelaine Corbin

Madelaine Corbin is a multi-disciplinary artist who works in drawing, fiber arts, installation, sculpture, and writing/prose. Her practice “endeavors to unearth the space between home and land, human and non-human, wild and managed landscapes, and the connection to one another through geographic distance.” She is based in Detroit, MI. Learn more about her at www.madelainecorbin.com.

Stewart Allen

Stewart Allen is a writer based in NY, NY. His published nonfiction books include The Devil’s Cup and In the Devil’s Garden, both of which deal with international foodways and religious plants. He is currently working on a novel that explores similar topics.

Fall 2020 Artists in Residence

Alexis Elton

Alexis Elton is an artist practicing sculpture and installation. A farmer and adobe builder who co-operated a farm in rural New Mexico, “her work is situated where art and agrarian systems meet with aims to create ephemeral sensory encounters.” She has shown her work nationally and internationally. She is based in Hudson Valley, NY. Learn more about her at www.alexiselton.com.

Alyssa Dennis

Alyssa Dennis is an interdisciplinary artist, educator, and practicing clinical herbalist. Her work has been exhibited throughout the U.S., and her illustration clients have included the National Aquarium and the National Children’s Museum. Based in Brooklyn, NY, she is currently working on a project that explores the human concept of invasive species. Learn more about her at www.alyssadennis.com

John Ryan

John Ryan is a writer based in Western Australia. His poetry and prose focuses on the plant life of Australia, particularly Southwest Australia and the New England region of New South Wales. He has authored and co-authored multiple books centered around plants and the environment, and is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of New England in Australia. Visit https://www.une.edu.au/staff-profiles/hass/jryan63 to learn more about him.

Lauren Winchester

Lauren Winchester is a poet based in San Carlos, California. Her poems are “deeply concerned with humanity’s relationship to the natural world,” and have appeared in The Journal, Passages North, TYPO, BOAAT, and other publications. Learn more about her at www.laurenwinchester.com.

Sarah Jones

Sarah Jones is an artist and garden designer who works in fiber arts and installation. Based in Seattle, WA, her current work examines “plant extinction and the grief presented by climate change.” Her art has been exhibited throughout the U.S. Learn more about her at www.sarahjonesstudio.com.

Shilpa Joglekar

Shilpa Joglekar is an artist practicing drawing, installation, painting, and sculpture. Based in Mumbai, India,  she founded and was the first Dean of Academy of Fine Arts & Crafts in Rachana Sansad, Mumbai. Her work, which explores human relationships with nature, has been exhibited throughout India and abroad. Learn more about her at http://shilpajoglekar.com.

Tamer Hassan

Tamer Hassan is a filmmaker based in Chicago. His current work focuses on the way people relate to their environment and traditions, and have included films on the history of seed saving in the U.S.; currently, he is researching the migration of Purple Martins, a bird that is dependent on humans for survival. His films have been screened nationally and internationally.

William Keefer

William Keefer is a writer and private investigator based in Brooklyn, NY. He is the author of Anamnesis, a novel that takes place in the Amazon rainforest, and publishes essays on plant medicine and other topics at www.williamkeefer.com. He is currently working on White Bear, a sequel to Anamnesis, which “continues the story of global consciousness evolution with an emphasis on the role of the plants in the process.”