Residency

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.

The climate crisis is an urgent global concern. Self as Universe: Mending Our Collective Ecosystem Residencies at A Studio in the Woods invite artists to explore the connections within our collective ecosystems and use the power of imagination to heal the wounds in the relationship between ourselves and our communities. Southeast Louisiana’s land and inhabitants are continually scarred by the effects of environmental degradation. These injuries – the historical to the present – affect our bodies, families, communities, and cultures, as well as the land and its other creatures.  We encourage artists to guide our collective response as the caretakers and caregivers to our universe while bringing wisdom, integrity, optimism, and even humor to intentional a