Linda Falkenstein
The artist-in-residence will be responsible for creating monthly events for the community.
There’s a new art studio in town, and it’s looking for its first resident guest artist.
The Thurber Park artist-in-residence program will be centered in a studio created in a newly restored Trachte building — the metal utility sheds made in Madison from 1919-1986. It’s located in Thurber Park, a pocket park just off Fair Oaks Avenue in the town of Blooming Grove, and is conceived as a way to connect an artist and the community surrounding the park. The 11-month residency calls for the artist to hold a public event once a month and create a final piece of public art for the Darbo-Worthington neighborhood, to be permanently installed.
“We started with the idea, could we commission public art from an artist who is embedded in community, so the community could see more of the art-making process?” says Karin Wolf, the city’s arts program administrator. That way, art becomes “not just an artist isolated in the studio and then at the end, plop, there’s your public art.”
The unusual studio space grew out of a need to “address lack of art spaces in Madison and demonstrate how we can use other kinds of spaces for art production,” says Wolf.
Artists will need to reside in Madison during the residency, which is expected to run from September 2019 through July of 2020.
Wolf says the selection committee is looking for an artist who can create a durable and fairly large piece of art that can withstand the elements, though the person ultimately chosen could also be “an emerging artist who has never done public art before, if they are interested in entering into that arena.”
The program is a partnership between the city of Madison and The Bubbler at Madison Public Library, and Wolf says the artist will get plenty of support from her and Bubbler staff. Bubbler liaison Trent Miller says library staff will be able to help with community connections for the monthly event programming. These interactions can vary. “It could be an open studio, or it could be a fleshed-out workshop,” says Wolf. “We’re trying not to be overly prescriptive.”
The selection panel will be “judging on the artist’s past work,” says Wolf. “They do not have to come up with a proposal for what they are going to do. They can send images of their past work and tell us why they are passionate about this opportunity.”
Wolf is hoping the first artist-in-residence is “really interested in that community process, in the neighborhood kids, in spending time in the studio.” The stipend for the 11 months is $6,500; the studio is free. The program will provide a budget of $18,400 for the permanent art piece and a $2,850 materials budget for the monthly community programs.
Wolf credits her colleague Jule Stroick, from the city planning department, for coming up with the idea while working on the Darbo-Worthington neighborhood plan a few years ago. Wolf says Stroick “recognized the opportunity when she saw this little Trachte hut, and I think there were plans to remove it, and she said ‘No, it’s adorable, can’t we put an artist in there?’”
Now the studio is complete, with the exception of the toilet — donated to the project by Kohler Co., but broken in transit. Wolf is waiting for its replacement.
More information about the residency and the application is available at madisonbubbler.org/thurberparkartistresidency. The deadline is June 24.
