Agreements to Provide Increased Financial Assistance to Students of Summer Program

Chautauqua Institution’s School of Art this week announced a series of new and reconfirmed partnerships designed to increase awareness of the renowned summer program and to provide its students with more attractive financial aid packages. The partnerships, spearheaded by Sharon Louden, recently appointed as the Sydelle Sonkin and Herb Siegel Artistic Director of the Visual Arts at Chautauqua Institution (VACI), represent a number of reaffirmed and completely new relationships for Chautauqua’s visual arts program with celebrated higher-education programs around the United States.

“I’m incredibly excited to announce these new partnerships, and grateful to these schools for their commitment to their students and affirmation of the value of VACI’s program,” said Louden, an artist, educator, advocate for artists, and editor of the Living and Sustaining a Creative Life series of books. “To provide the students who attend these schools and Chautauqua’s School of Art residency with extra financial resources is a gift that will assists artists who would never have the opportunity to attend, and allow them to more deeply experience their time in our program.”

Chautauqua’s partner schools to date, and their offers of support to students accepted into the VACI School of Art summer residency program are as follows:

• Austin Peay State University will offer an opportunity for up to two of its students to be fully financially supported.
• Cornish College of the Arts will offer matching scholarships for one or two of its students.
• Georgia Southern University will match one or more scholarships for any of its students.
• Marshall University will offer a matching scholarship to one of its students.
• Pratt Institute is offering the inaugural Pratt/VACI Fellowship in Pedagogy, which enables a graduate student to teach a course through the mentorship of artist Hasan Elahi, core faculty in Chautauqua’s School of Art residency program, associate professor at the University of Maryland and board member of Creative Capital.
• The University of Arkansas will offer a full scholarship for one of its students. 
• The University of Central Arkansas will offer matching scholarships to one or two of their students.
• The University of Cincinnati will offertwo of its ceramic students opportunities to teach as young faculty members Special Studies courses and train underthe mentorship of Ceramic Specialist and Visiting Artist Raoul Pacheco at VACI.
• The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley will offer a full or matching scholarship for one of their students.
• Tyler School of Art at Temple University will offer a full scholarship for one of its students.

In addition, Chautauqua has endorsements from the following schools, who have committed to promoting the Chautauqua School of Art program and encouraging students and their alumni to apply: LaGuardia Community College; Moravian College; the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts; the Schneider Museum at Southern Oregon University; the School of Visual Arts (SVA); the State University of New York Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT)and more.

Louden continues to be in conversation with more schools and organizations to join the list of partnerships.

The 2019 artists-in-residence program at VACI welcomes students and emerging artists who have yet to receive wide recognition of their work, including artists as young as juniors in college. Artists who engage in all media are encouraged to apply. This is an environment that promotes collaboration, exchange, and an openness to other art forms at Chautauqua, which includes dance, theater, music and more.

The program has core faculty along with visiting artists who will hold workshops and give lectures through the summer. Corefaculty will host weekly one-on-one conversations with students and emerging artists and will conduct classes of their specialties. For more information or to apply, visit art.chq.org. The application deadline is March 1, 2019.