Reading Residency

For three years, the Reading Residency
was a juried program designed specifically
for agents of social change to
dedicate a full weekend to themselves: 
FOR reading and self-care.

The Winner of each residency receives free housing and amenities on site, in addition to a small stipend for food and reading material.

Applicants that receive an Honorable Mention will have a book of their choice purchased and shipped to them as a gift.

From 2017–2019, there has been one Reading Residency per year—a nourishing weekend scheduled by the winning resident, based in Chicago.

In 2019, there was TWO RESIDENCY WINNERS: one for a residency based in Chicago, IL and another for a residency in Valencia, Spain, in partnership with our collaborators at The Liminal.

(Más detalles en Español en la parte inferior de esta página).

CHICAGO, IL:

VALENCIA, SPAIN:

To Apply

Please read all of the details affiliated with this residency on this page to best educate yourself on what you are applying for.

Do not hesitate to ask any questions if you have them.

The application for each individual residency has a fee of $7.00.

Amenities

• $150 / 130€ stipend for reading material, food + drink.

• Available Spirits

• Tea + Coffee

• Light Breakfast + Snacks

• Access to Candor Arts / The Liminal Library

• Heat

• NO Internet access

• NO Television

• NO Computer

EXPECTATIONS of the winning residents

• The residency is entirely spent taking care of yourself, through reading and/or relaxing.

• Stay from Friday evening to Monday morning.

• Arrange transportation to arrive + depart on time (please inquire if you need extra details for neighborhood travel—please understand that the site addresses will only be given to the winners)

• A short written reflection on your experience.

ELIGIBILITY

The judging panels will base their scoring on:

• Candidate's working relationship to social progress.

• What will be read at this residency and why.

• Applicant's essay about why this residency is appropriate and timely for the candidate.

WINNING RESIDENTS & HonORABLE MENTIONS:

2017
Winner: TASASHA HENDERSON
Honorable Mentions: NINA YEBOAH & MICHAEL FISCHER

2018
Winner: NOEL QUIÑONES
Honorable Mentions: ANAÏS DUPLAN, JOHNNIE JAE MORRIS, JEAN CHO

2019
Chicago Winner: JEN DELOS REYES
Spain Winner: JOSE LUIS BENAVIDES
Honorable Mentions: LEILA WEEFUR, DANIELLE MCCOY, JANNA AÑONUEVO LANGHOLZ

REFLECTIONS from the RESIDENTS:

Residencies can provide a break from the act of daily maintenance. Even though this residency is housed in a domestic space I am still liberated from the demands of my own. The fact that this residency took place in a home is significant. Over the course of the weekend I read four books cover to cover, came up with new class assignments, re-adjusted my relationship to social media and technology, got clarity on a book project and came up with an outline and the title: Turning Up: Showing Up for Yourself, Each Other, and a World in Crisis. I was able to come to this clarity because a choice was made to make one’s private space a resource for their creative community. For those of us fortunate enough to have a place to live, this is a model that is replicable and adaptable.

In my own home when I read on Sundays I like to follow the sun as it comes through the windows and read in the bright warm places it creates. This weekend I had the luxury of finding new sun spots. While I am only in a new neighborhood and not a new city, when I travel to a place I like to always be sure to make a contribution in some way to the local economy/ecology.  I am leaving behind one of the books I brought with me as an offering to the Liminal Library and I am about to follow the sun outside to walk to the neighborhood bookstore to buy a copy of Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, and then go to a flower shop to buy a rose to leave in the apartment as a small and thematic gesture of gratitude.

Last month I was at a panel on “Alternate Visions & Counter Institutions” moderated by Courtney Reid-Eaton where she began the discussion by bringing in a bouquet of flowers and calling into the space the legacy of the 1912 Bread and Roses textile workers strike organized primarily by women. “We want bread and roses too" became the rallying cry of the movement and demanded that their full humanity be acknowledged and cared for. It reminds me of the title of the Audre Lorde piece I quoted at the beginning of this reflection, “Poetry Is Not a Luxury.” In fact the bread and roses slogan came itself from a poem of the same name by James Oppenheim:

No more the drudge and idler, ten that toil where one reposes,

But a sharing of life’s glories: Bread and roses, bread and roses.

Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;

Hearts starve as well as bodies; bread and roses, bread and roses.

For Lorde poetry is necessary for survival, it is not sterile word play but a revelatory distillation of experience...It forms the quality of light within which we predicate our hopes and dreams toward survival and change, first made into language, then into idea, then into more tangible action. I am grateful for the time and space that this reading residency dedicated to agents of social change has provided me with. I am leaving feeling grounded, nurtured, and ready to continue down the thorny rose lined path toward a more just world.

—Jen Delos Reyes, 2019 Reading Residency Winner (Chicago).

The above text is an excerpt from Jen Delos Reyes’ reflection essay:
A Rose Named Survivor: An Unexpected Reflection on Aging, Reading, Resistance, and Community Support.
October 6, 2019
READ FULL TEXT HERE.

“I'm a very spiritual person and so there was a real cosmic alignment that happened when I arrived at the residency. My four days in Chicago were truly a welcome breath of fresh air, as so many of the reasons I came and so many of the things that happened came crashing together. First and foremost I applied to the residency because my Great Grandfather was a member of the Borinqueneers, an all-Puerto Rican military battalion who fought during the Korean War. As a member of this battalion, he was made a prisoner of war in Korea, and never heard from again. I had to connect the dots of his story and so I set out to read a very dense book of history entitled "Honor and Fidelity: The 65th Infantry in Korea, 1950-1953 - U.S. Army in the Korean War" by Gilberto N. Villahermosa. I don't think I ever would have had the uninterrupted time needed to comb through it if not for this residency. I was able to bring my great grandfather's unredacted military records along with me and so I made a timeline of his tour through North and South Korea as I read, laying the ground work for a chapbook of poems I seek to write about him in the coming year. 

While I did this work inside, I would take breaks to explore outside the residency, in the historic Puerto Rican neighborhood of Humboldt Park. What a beautiful movement of the universe to place me in this Puerto Rican mecca as I reflected and read about my Great Grandfather’s journey from Puerto Rico to Korea. I walked up and down Division Street just taking it all in and this in fact enhanced my reading of the history of the Korean War believe it or not. I do not believe in coincidences, and so it was only right that my work and my surroundings were in constant conversation.

This residency came right on time and proved to me the power of reading as not just an individual endeavor but a foundation for knowledge with which to engage with the broader world. I recommend this experience to anyone who needs a break from their day to day hustle and savors the peace of reading a fresh book in a new and beautiful space. Muchísima gracias!

—Noel Quiñones, 2018 Reading Residency Winner

"When I arrived at the residency space that was to be my home for the weekend, I felt a sense of excitement as I took in the warm and cozy surroundings. The book that I had picked to read for the weekend was No More Heroes: Grassroots Challenges to the Savior Mentality by Jordan Flaherty. It had been on my list to read for a while, because the issues the book addresses are important and relatable to the work I engage in. The main thesis of the book is that when it comes to grassroots social justice work, our mindset shouldn’t be that we are saving people and that our education and privilege means we should be in charge of organizations and projects. We should follow the lead of those most impacted by oppression and center the needs of the most marginalized.

Throughout the weekend, I was able to reflect on how these ideas show up in my own work and reading No More Heroes was a great reminder to myself to constantly check-in about my own practices and mindset. In addition to reading No More Heroes, I had the opportunity to begin reading We Gon’ Be Alright: Notes on Race and Resegregation by Jeff Chang, which was available in the residency’s amazing library.

I would highly recommend applying for the Candor Arts reading residency. It is a great opportunity to take some time away from our busy lives to devote to reading, resting, self-care and reflection. The reading residency is a great way to recharge yourself and prepare to continue your work with a renewed sense of purpose, energy, and passion."

—Tasasha Henderson, 2017 Reading Residency Winner

PANELs OF JURORS for the reading residency:

2017

Tempestt Hazel — Writer, Curator, and Executive Director of Sixty Inches from Center
EJ Hill — Artist and Educator
Lynnette Miranda — Artist, Curator, and Writer, Founder of Present Futures and Make-Space
David Bell — Artist, Curator, and Writer, Director of Visitor Welcome Center and Notes on Looking
Etta Sandry — Artist, Educator, and Writer, Co-director of Make-Space
Jesús Mejia — Artist
Amir George — Artist, Filmmaker, and Curator, Founder of The Cinema Culture and Co-Curator of Black Radical Imagination
Justin Nalley — Artist and Educator, Author of TAKE CARE

2018

KENDRA CURRY-KHANNA (Chicago, IL) — Executive Director at 826CHI
SAM BAILEY (Chicago, IL / Los Angeles, CA) — Director, Writer, and Digital Art Director of VAM Studio
LAUB (Los Angeles, CA) — Artist
TOBY CAUSBY (Chicago, IL) — Learning & Development Consultant
KATIE CHUNG (Chicago, IL) — Artist
TERESA CARLESIMO (Kingston, Ontario) — artist, writer, scholar
JEFFREY MICHAEL AUSTIN (Chicago, IL) — Artist and musician
ORIANA KOREN (Los Angeles, CA) — Photographer-Writer
IRIS YIREI HU (Los Angeles, CA) — Artist
LA KEISHA LEEK (Brooklyn, NY) — independent exhibition organizer and writer; Manager, Kenan Project at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, creator of How to Make A Hood (Candor Arts, August 2015)
CECIL MCDONALD, JR. (Chicago, IL) — Artist and educator, author of In the Company of Black (Candor Arts, April 2017)
SUZAN GELDHOFF, MA (Rotterdam, Netherlands) — visual arts professional specialized in photography
VIVIAN SMING (San Francisco, CA) — Artist, Writer, Editor in Chief of Art Practical, Founding Editor of Nonsensical, Founder & Publisher of Sming Sming Books
CONOR DOWDLE (Minneapolis, MN) — Artist, and Co-Director of Yeah Maybe 
KATE BOWEN (Chicago, IL) — Artist, Organizer, Director of ACRE Projects and Video Programming Coordinator at the Museum of Contemporary Photography
A-LAN HOLT (Bay Area, CA) — Playwright, Filmmaker, Associate Director at IDA Stanford, author of Moonwork (Candor Arts, June 2016)
CHINWE OKONA (Los Angeles, CA) — Artist, Writer, Creator of PALMSS Mag
MELANIE TERESA BOHRER (Munich, Germany / Chicago, IL) — Artist
ERIN HOYT (Chicago, IL) — Director of Operations at Filter Photo
CHRISTIAN ORTIZ (Chicago, IL) — Artist, educator, and Senior Manager of Studio Programs at Marwen
LAUREN M. PACHECO (Chicago, IL / Gary, IN) — Arts Administrator, Community Organizer, and Co-Founder of Chicago Lowrider Festival and Chicago Urban Art Society
MATTHEW ANDERSON (Los Angeles, CA) — Artist and Filmmaker, creator of Deviant Proposals: an anti-binary journal (Candor Arts, April 2018)
SARA J. WINSTON (Peekskill, NY) — Artist, author of A Lick and a Promise (Candor Arts, September 2017)
DAVID BELL (Los Angeles, CA) — Artist and Director of Visitor Welcome Center, author of Bye Bye Broadway (Candor Arts, August 2016)

2019 [CHICAGO, U.S.A.]

ANNIE ZEAN DUNBAR

(Chicago, IL) — Researcher and Writer

VIVIAN SMING

(San Francisco, CA) — Artist, Writer, Editor in Chief of Art Practical, Founding Editor of Nonsensical, Founder & Publisher of Sming Sming Books

LA KEISHA LEEK

(Chicago, IL) — Exhibition Organizer; Co-Founder, The Petty Biennial; Arts worker at Project&;  creator of How to Make A Hood (Candor Arts, August 2015)

E.J. HILL

(Los Angeles, CA) — Artist

S.Y LIM 

(Chicago, IL) — Artist, Singer, Executive Director at 062 Gallery

DEVYN LORELEI MAÑIBO

(Chicago, IL) — Artist, Educator, Organizer

FELICIA HOLMAN

(Chicago, IL) — interdisciplinary artist/curator & arts administrator

ELANA SCHLENKER

(Pittsburgh, PA / Brooklyn, NY) — Designer, art director, principal of Studio Elana Schlenker and Out of Office, and publisher of Gratuitous Type

DAVID BELL

(Los Angeles, CA) — Space Operator of Visitor Welcome Center, author of Bye Bye Broadway (Candor Arts, August 2016)

SARA J. WINSTON

(Peekskill, NY) — Artist, author of A Lick and a Promise (Candor Arts, September 2017)

ARIEL GENTALEN

(Chicago, IL) — "Curator," organizer, and skater, Residency & Public Programs Manager @ Hyde Park Art Center

CHRISTOPHER KARDAMBIKIS

(Fairfax, VA) — Artist and Assistant Professor at George Mason University

TARA PIXLEY

(Los Angeles, CA) — Professor, Visual Journalist

PAULA WILSON

(Carrizozo, NM) — Artist and Co-Founder of Carrizozo Artist in Residence and MoMAZoZo

KATIE CHUNG

(Chicago, IL) — Artist

H.M. BATSEL

(Chicago, IL) — Artist

2019 [VALENCIA, SPAIN]

CARMEN ROYUELA

(Valencia, Spain) — Translator

ALEJANDRO GRANERO FERRER

(Valencia, Spain) — Artist and PhD Candidate

CARME MARISCAL

(Valencia, Spain) — Art Historian and Communication Manager

SEBASTIÁN BARRANTE

(Santiago de Chile) —Artist and Editor at Naranja Publicaciones

SEBASTIÁN ARANCIBIA

(Santiago de Chile) — Artist, Architect and Editor at Naranja Publicaciones

PABLO VINDEL

(Valencia, Spain) — Artist, Writer and Co-founder at The Liminal

MARÍA ESPÍ

(Valencia, Spain) — Illustrator, Visual Communicator and Co-founder at The Liminal

RESIDENCIA PARA LECTORXS

¿EN QUÉ CONSISTE NUESTRA RESIDENCIA PARA LECTORXS?

Convocatoria diseñada especialmente para individuxs que apuesten por un cambio social profundo y que quieran dedicar un fin de semana completo a sí mismxs: para leer y cultivar su bienestar.

El/la lector/a seleccionadx recibirá alojamiento situado en el barrio del Jardín Botánico de Valencia con todas las comodidades, además de una pequeña paga para dietas y material de lectura (que especificamos más adelante en esta misma ficha informativa).

Lanzamos una residencia por año en Chicago y otra en Valencia (España). Nuestro objetivo es hacer crecer juntos este proyecto hacia la consolidación de una red de múltiples residencias para lectorxs en diferentes ciudades y países.

La tasa de solicitud es de 5 euros.

¿QUÉ OFRECEMOS?

• Cobertura de gastos a través de una única paga de 135 euros

• Bebidas (no alcohólicas)

• Café y té

• Desayuno ligero continental y snacks

• Acceso completo a la biblioteca de The Liminal y libre consulta de nuestros libros de artista

• Alojamiento y local climatizados con bomba de aire frío/calor

• Aunque en caso de emergencia contamos con teléfono y conexión Wi-Fi y por cable, nuestra política de residencia te propone, para que puedas concentrar toda tu energía en la lectura, el NO utilizar internet en tu dispositivo móvil, televisión ni ordenador

Cada artista residente recibirá un pack regalo con un fanzine editado por The Liminal en una de nuestras LIMINAL TOTES.

¿QUÉ ESPERAMOS DE NUESTRXS RESIDENTES?

• La residencia es un espacio dedicado exclusivamente a cuidar de ti mismx: a través de la lectura y el relax

• Estancia completa: desde el viernes por la tarde hasta el lunes por la mañana

• Reserva de tu transporte de ida y vuelta con anticipación

  • [La residencia se ubica en el barrio del Botànic/Petxina en la ciudad de València. La dirección completa será revelada sólo a lxs lectorxs seleccionadxs]

• Un breve reflexión por escrito de tu experiencia con nosotrxs

• Una breve encuesta sobre qué mejorarías o cambiarías de tu residencia con nosotrxs

PROCESO DE SELECCIÓN

El comité de selección basará su decisión en:

• La relación efectiva del/a candidatx con el progreso social

• El libro elegido y el porqué

• El formulario de solicitud justificando por qué nuestra residencia de lectura es apropiada en concepto y tiempo para el/la candidatx