Open Season

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Tomorrow marks open application season for most of the schools I am applying to this year. I already started my applications to University of Texas and University of Washington, as well as the correspondence that goes along with the application process. Soon enough I will have a list of essay topics required for each school. Some are more specific than others. University of Texas requires a statement of purpose, along with a statement about the work being submitted:

B. Statement of Purpose

(1) Write about any relevant experiences that have prepared you as an artist and describe why this is the right time for you to go to graduate school and Texas is the right place.
(2) Describe your professional goals and how you plan to actively achieve them while in school and after.
(3) What is your vision of an energized graduate program? Describe what you can contribute (initiate and risk) to enhance such a program.

C. Statement about your Artwork
(a) Discuss and describe the artwork you are submitting.
(b) Reflect on how you work, take chances, make discoveries and struggle when work doesn’t go well, and how this process enables you to define and redefine yourself as an artist.

Whereas University of Washington ‘simply’ requires:

Statement of Purpose: Type a one-page statement that describes your artistic and academic interests and your reasons for pursuing graduate studies at the University of Washington.

While one page sounds great, that’s not a lot of room to write, especially on such a broad topic. Both essays require quite a bit of introspection, which I am looking forward to. It will be interesting to compare how my practice has grown since last year.

Other than starting my applications, I confirmed my residency at Vermont Studio Center today and sent in the confirmation deposit. I inquired toward starting my residency mid-month, and through speaking with the coordinator I determined that it would be best to start at the beginning of the month in order to meet the other artists and attend orientation meetings. I am planning on applying for a grant from the Idaho Commission on the Arts to help fund the other half of the residency. They provide grants to artists every quarter, which gives me an opportunity to apply in September, and also in December if I don’t make the first round.

Tomorrow I will be helping to hang a show titled A & P: Atlantic & Pacific by Marc Boone, a painter living in Baltimore and teaching at the University of Maryland at College Park. Marc Boone earned his BFA at PNCA way back when it was still the Museum Art School, and his MFA at the Maryland Institute College of Art. The opening for the show is this Friday at the Lorinda Knight Gallery in Spokane. After hanging the show I’ll be jetting over to Saranac Art Projects for the bi-monthly meeting. Hopefully I’ll round up some ideas for the new website which I was asked to help design.

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Lastly, Georgia O’keefe would be proud to know that my oriental poppies are officially starting to look like vaginas. A curious tree frog stopped by today to check them out and ended up basking all day in the shade of the tobacco plants.

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