About the Residency

Every residency begins wih two questions

1. What does your ideal day look like?

2. How can we make your ideal day sustainable?

There is no prescription nor formula for an “ideal” artist in residence for The Hosting. We like to work with artists whom are curious about the path of their creative lives and are in a state of “seeking.” We encourage question-based projects, without emphasizing answer and/or solution. Rather, exploring clarification and specificity of the working questions leads to new, to creation in it’s true ultimate form. 

Applying artists can work in any medium and should share in The Hosting’s value of over-communication. A pattern I witness in applicants is a boredom with self-driven practice. This residency is catered towards ensemble mentalities, asking for help, critique, and accountability. 

Applying artists should be prepared to abandon any learned habits that no longer serve their creative practice in favor of building more sustainable habits. 

The Hosting is drawn to vulnerability and surprise. The mediums we are inspired by and try to inspire is work that promotes honesty without performance. We are drawn to folk tradition, storytelling, and limitlessness. We are drawn to less talky talky and more doing in the body. 

Here are some ways that The Hosting supports our artists during their time in residency:

Residencies begin with a conversation between myself and the artist. Within residencies, my role as Executive Director functions as producer and critic. I ask “What do you need in order to make the work you want to make? What do you need in order to live the life you want to live?” The aims of the residency are a constantly moving target, and it is the job of The Hosting to keep chasing the target with a flashlight, illuminating the changes in process and projection. 

The Hosting can provide: structure, conversation, and consistent pressure of accountability. The Hosting can provide therapeutic tools of intuitive tarot readings, somatic therapy practice, and guided meditation. The primary support that The Hosting is committed to supporting is doing in the body. Our mantra is “There is no alternative to the work.” Thinking about practice and talking about practice is not practicing.