Elsewhere Living Museum & Artist Residency (Greensboro, NC) has released its 2022 call for over 30 artists to participate in its annual residency program.

2022 call information and application are on Elsewhere’s website at elsewheremuseum.org/residencies-2022. The deadline to apply is January 3rd, 2022 at 11:59PM EST. Applicants will be notified by January 31st. There will be a Residencies 2022 Town Hall on Wednesday 12/1 from 6-7PM EST on Zoom to answer questions of prospective applicants. Register here.

Two new residency programs have been added for 2022.

The Collaborative Family Residency invites four families to create as collaborative units, with each family member of different ages and abilities participating in the residency. Artists collaborate with their child(ren), parent(s), sibling(s), or chosen family.
The Greensboro Contemporary Jewish Museum Social Practice Institute will train Jewish identifying artists in the South in the methodology and pedagogy of socially engaged art practice alongside a curriculum of Jewish thought leadership. (Separate call forthcoming.)

Also featured are Elsewhere’s two long-standing curatorial initiatives that are paid fellowships offering honoraria, travel expenses, materials budget, and room and board.

The Southern Constellations Fellowship is an annual, curated residency program that explores experimental practices across a network of Southern artists and organizations.
The Urban Exchange Fellowship fosters exchange between Elsewhere and emerging ecologies of contemporary art production in major cities across the United States. This year’s city is New Orleans.

For 2022, Elsewhere has eliminated residency fees that have been associated with participating in its Foundational Residency. Historically artists paid up to $1,050 in program and room/board fees, which represented about one fourth of the cost per resident and was still modest compared to other residency programs. Eliminating these fees was an important step to making residencies more financially accessible to artists, with the longer term goal to be able to pay every artist to participate. It is part of the organization’s equity plan that also includes efforts to become W.A.G.E. (wageforwork.com) certified, a voluntary commitment to meeting field-wide equitable artist pay standards. Additionally, Elsewhere has created an Artist In Residence Financial Assistance Fund that anyone can contribute to directly in order to enable participation from artists who face additional financial barriers.

Elsewhere’s last regular residency call took place over 2 years ago in 2019. The majority of 2020 residencies were postponed to 2021 due to COVID. In their stead, Elsewhere developed Shelter Elsewhere, hosting 7 artists for 3-6 months to live in a COVID-safe bubble and creative community inside the museum. Of the 31 artists that were rescheduled in 2021 from 2020, only 17 were ultimately able to come for a wide range of personal and professional circumstances. The 17 artists that did come created an incredible array of films, installations, sculpture, books, a giant puppet, a drive-in movie and prom diorama, and actual musical chairs. Southern Constellations Fellow, Mia Cinelli, developed an Elsewhere typeface using collection fridge magnets and fabric patterns. The typeface is now used in almost all digital and print design at Elsewhere.

Elsewhere’s residency experience is intense. It may be more akin to a film production than to a retreat. Residents arrive as a cohort of 5-7 on a Thursday, give artist talks on Saturday, and the following Tuesday pitch project proposals for a site-specific artwork to be completed within three weeks. Projects are mostly made with the museum’s collection of books, toys, clothing, and other materials of the former thrift store. In Elsewhere’s 18-year history, over 500 artists have come from across North Carolina, the US for this utterly unique artistic opportunity. 2021 artist in residence, Cara Hagan, shares that, “[b]eing a resident at Elsewhere is one of the most memorable experiences I have had to date as an artist. The freedom and encouragement to play and discover new and dormant parts of my practice was invigorating and has given me inspiration, impetus, and tangible tools to continue working with long after the conclusion of the residency.”

Elsewhere was awarded $100,000 of program support over two years by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts as part of the Fall 2020 cohort of grant recipients. Of the 51 organizations who received funding, 7 were located in the South, and Elsewhere was the only organization located in the state of North Carolina. Elsewhere was one of 21 organizations nationally and internationally receiving two years of program support.

Rachel Bers, Program Director of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, states that, “Elsewhere runs a strong artist residency program, based on trust in artists and an embrace of collaboration in all its forms. The organization’s support for artists who take creative risks and build meaningful peer and community relationships through their work, aligns well with the foundation’s belief in the value of experimental practice and the importance of artistic participation in cultural and civic conversations.”

Elsewhere is considered a North Carolina Arts Council State Arts Resource, receiving $15,750 in support for residencies in their 2021-2022 grant cycle. On November 9th, the National Endowment for the Arts awarded Elsewhere a $15,000 Art Projects grant for its 2022 Residency Program. Local arts council, ArtsGreensboro, has been instrumental in securing relief funding from the city, county, and state to support Greensboro’s arts community during COVID, including Elsewhere.

We want to give a special thanks to the staff who have spent time developing this process, the registration form, and coordinating the artists. You can learn of our team through the People part of our website, but we want to highlight the work of our Programs Manager, Jess Hoyle who diligently and meticulously planned this call and the details related. Most importantly, we want to thank YOU! It is because of your interest and support for our creative community that we are even capable of doing this. It is our honor and pleasure to create these experiences and hope they lead us to a more collaborative future together. We thank you for your patience, and for your time.

More information about Elsewhere is available at elsewheremuseum.org.

Media contact: Matthew Giddings, Executive Director, matthew [at] goelsewhere.org, 336.907.3271

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Elsewhere Living Museum and Artist Residency

606 S. Elm St.

Greensboro, NC 27406

November 22, 2021 at 10:30am