Border Art Residency
The Border Art Residency, a non-profit organization affiliated with the El Paso Community Foundation, offers a selected artist a period of retreat for creative work. The BAR currently rents a spacious living/studio space in La Union, New Mexico, located 15 miles from El Paso, Texas, in the scenic Mesilla Valley. Resident artists are provided with a fully furnished living/working space, all utilities (except phone and computer), and a monthly stipend of $600.
The BAR occupies the upper floor of a converted cotton gin. While it is very comfortable and spacious, the space is not accessible to those with physical disabilities. No children or pets are allowed in the space (except for short visits), and we request that artists and guests refrain from smoking indoors. The loft is furnished with a washer and dryer, a television, kitchen and dining utensils, and other basic necessities. Residents must provide their own linens.
The BAR differs from many artist residency programs since it is designed for a single artist (or couple) in a remote and unique locale near the US/Mexico border. It is best suited to a self-sufficient individual who seeks a period of quiet and solitude for serious artistic inquiry and production. The selection is made by a panel of nationally recognized artists and arts professionals.
The BAR occupies the upper floor of a converted cotton gin. While it is very comfortable and spacious, the space is not accessible to those with physical disabilities. No children or pets are allowed in the space (except for short visits), and we request that artists and guests refrain from smoking indoors. The loft is furnished with a washer and dryer, a television, kitchen and dining utensils, and other basic necessities. Residents must provide their own linens.
The BAR differs from many artist residency programs since it is designed for a single artist (or couple) in a remote and unique locale near the US/Mexico border. It is best suited to a self-sufficient individual who seeks a period of quiet and solitude for serious artistic inquiry and production. The selection is made by a panel of nationally recognized artists and arts professionals.
Artists in Residence (IN PROGRESS: check back soon for more photos of our artists!)
Patrick Kikut: 2000
Carlos Gutierrez: 2000
Margarita Cabrera: 2001
Nicole Entebi: 2002
A Los Angeles based artist and organizer, Nicole Entebi works in video, animation, and installation. Antebi’s work has been exhibited internationally.
She recently co-edited Water, CA: Creative Visualizations for a New Millennium, an experiment in web publishing with Enid Baxter Blader. Water, CA is slated to exhibit at the Crocker Museum in Fall 2011 and the Montalvo Art Center in Spring 2011.
Other recent projects include the exhibition Through the Looking Glass: The Los Angeles Aqueduct with May Jong at Sea and Space Explorations 2009; the book Failure! Experiments in Aesthetic and Social Practices (co-edited with Colin Dickey and Robby Herbst), published by the Journal of Aesthetics and Protest Press 2007; the exhibition Failure Ridiculous Terrible Wonderful at Park Projects in Los Angeles 2007 (co-organized with Robby Herbst and Irene Tsatsos); and the exhibition, Salton Sea Projects, at Kristi Engle Gallery 2007.
Danny Alvarez: 2002
Nicole Entebi: 2002
A Los Angeles based artist and organizer, Nicole Entebi works in video, animation, and installation. Antebi’s work has been exhibited internationally.
She recently co-edited Water, CA: Creative Visualizations for a New Millennium, an experiment in web publishing with Enid Baxter Blader. Water, CA is slated to exhibit at the Crocker Museum in Fall 2011 and the Montalvo Art Center in Spring 2011.
Other recent projects include the exhibition Through the Looking Glass: The Los Angeles Aqueduct with May Jong at Sea and Space Explorations 2009; the book Failure! Experiments in Aesthetic and Social Practices (co-edited with Colin Dickey and Robby Herbst), published by the Journal of Aesthetics and Protest Press 2007; the exhibition Failure Ridiculous Terrible Wonderful at Park Projects in Los Angeles 2007 (co-organized with Robby Herbst and Irene Tsatsos); and the exhibition, Salton Sea Projects, at Kristi Engle Gallery 2007.
Danny Alvarez: 2002
Kumi Yamashita: 2003
"Shadows are a fine medium for someone who believes more in variability ... than in constancy, a stance that may be temperamental as well as philosophical.” –
Kumi Yamashita was the artist in residence from 2002-2003. Known for using simple materials to create optical illusions, her “Shadow Art” has earned her worldwide attention and commissions. Her art has been featured in galleries and museums in the US, UK, Japan, Turkey, and most recently in Taiwan. She has also been featured in prestigious art-industry publications such as Art Forum, Art in America and ARTL!ES.
Her vision and talent shows through in her “Shadow Art” in which she strategically adheres pieces of wood or other materials to a wall. When lit by a single light from a specific angle, these materials cast shadows that mysteriously detail silhouettes of people and objects.
Philip Zimmermann: 2004
“My Border Art Residency experience was a terrific creative time for me and had a large impact on my work. I am grateful for having had that year to work without distraction; I made more work during that time than probably any other time in my life. I’m still using photographs that I took then in my current work.”
Philip Zimmermann was the artist in residence from 2003-2004. Since 1975 he has worked primarily in the medium of artists' books. He is currently Professor of Visual Communication at the University of Arizona in Tucson and writes reviews for arts organizations and for art-book journals. Philip’s work can be found in The Joan Flasch Artist Book Archive at the School of Art Institute Chicago, the Special Collection at Yale University, The Fogg Museum at Harvard, The Museum of Modern Art, and the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.
His most recent book, Sanctus Sonorensis, features photographs taken while he was at the Border at Residency. The book comments on the complicated attitudes of Americans on illegal immigration from Mexico. The cover shows a photograph of the area if Southern Arizona, which is the most active in terms of migration across the Sonoran Desert, where thousands have lost their lives in the deadly desert heat.
Jose Krapp: 2005
Jose Krapp earned his BA from the University of Texas at El Paso and his MFA from New York University. He works primarily in sculpture and drawing. Most of his “combines” incorporate hardware - ladders, wires, lamps, extension cords - and ordinary items - cigarettes, instant soup packets, garbage bags, beer bottles, towers of steel wool pads, etc.
His work has been shown at the Dallas Contemporary, Tropico de Nopal Gallery in Los Angeles, The Bower Gallery in San Antonio, at Hunter College, The Cooper Union School of Art, and The Bronx Museum of the Arts in New York. He has participated in The Bronx Museum of the Arts’ “Artists In The Marketplace Program” and has been artist in residence at The Henry Street Settlement in Manhattan’s lower east side.
Adrian Esparza: 2006
“The reactive nature of art-making is letting the work talk to you while you’re creating it. While it’s happening, from moment to moment, it’s chaotic and energetic, and I like to hone in on that, the isolated experience, the happenstance. I’ve always been influenced by happenstance and dreams.”
Adrian Esparza was the artist-in-residence from 2005-2006. The El Paso-based artist creates art from mass-produced consumer goods such as ceramic pieces, t-shirts, posters and serapes. He deconstructs these items and reconfigures them in geometric patterns, disrupting their original intent. His handmade grids and designs often make reference to the US/Mexico border, and also provide warmth and cultural significance to the rigid impersonality that is associated with mechanical grids and digital pixels.
Esparza received his BFA from the University of Texas at El Paso and an MFA degree from California Institute of the Arts. He has participated in several art residency programs and currently teaches Design and Drawing at UTEP and Art Appreciation at El Paso Community College. His work has been exhibited at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Conduit Gallery Project Room in Dallas, the Cue Art Foundation in New York City, and the Arthouse in Austin.
Rie Kawakami: 2008
“As soon as I started the residency, I sensed that the director Ray Parish and his wife Becky Hendrick loved this place and were giving lots of effort to manage it. I am grateful that I could work on pieces and explore my ideas more than I was expecting. Also, sharing time with students and faculty at UTEP gave me a lot of good energy and inspiration.” – Rie Kawakami
Rie Kawakami was the artist in residence from 2007-2008. Her sculptures feature steel, but she also incorporates concrete, rubber and plastic. She earned a BA from Tama Art University in Tokyo and an MFA from the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts & Music. Rie has had several solo exhibitions around the world, but mostly emanating from her home in Japan.
Susannah Mira
A recent note from Susannah: Nice to hear that it's "that season" again, and yet another artist is getting the chance to experience the magic of your hospitality and the creative freedom of the BAR.
All is well here in Houston--I think I mentioned that I have a great new job at Rice, part-time with benefits in academic affairs. Earlier this summer Luis and I took an amazing trip to China and I continue to completely dig him. The most exciting art news is that I recently found out I was awarded one of the Houston Arts Alliance's individual artist grants, a really nice chunk of cash to facilitate new work. Strange as it may seem, this swamp has been good to me in so many ways.
Scott McMahon
Teaching: In September 2012 I took a tenure track assistant professor position at Columbia College, in Columbia, Missouri. I teach courses in photography (both digital and analog, video and photo history).
Exhibitions/Residencies: In May/June 2012 I was artist in residence at iPark in East Haddam, CT.
In September/October 2012 I was part of a two-person (collaborative) exhibition at The Lightroom Gallery in Philadelphia, PA “The Letters Project: Light and Chemical Correspondence” with collaborator Ahmed Salvador. (write-up in The Art Blog http://www.theartblog.org/2012/09/letters-project-the-light-room/).
Five photographs included in The Doors of Perception: Vision and Innovation in Alternative Processes exhibition at The Photographic Resource Center in Boston, MA from Feb. 5, 2013-March 23, 2013.
In April 2013 I will have a solo exhibition of kinetic sculpture at Columbia College.
In October 2013 I will have a solo exhibition at Orr Street Studios in Columbia, MO.
Later this year six of my photographs to be included in a pinhole photography exhibition at The Palace of the Governors in Santa Fe, NM. These photographs will become part of their permanent collection and published in an accompanying exhibition catalog.
http://bostonglobe.com/arts/theater-art/2013/02/21/review-opening-doors-perception-photographic-resource-center/OovpSMbg0cq1fQTkDKDzOI/story.html
Chika Matsuda: 2012
“Our existence today is a continuation of our endless history. The sound we hear today is a reverberation of the past, and the sound we make today echoes to the past. The words come out from our mouth are the words said before us. I am working on a series that involves video, sculpture, and drawing to demonstrate sound as an eternal vibration and of the mortality within our human condition.”
Chika Matsuda works with sculpture, video, and installation, and often uses found objects and materials. Matsuda’s art practice contemplates the way we live our daily lives, our perception of life, and how we consume and reproduce resources. Her work investigates the relationship between the rational and irrational, and how perception and experience are influenced by language, cultural context, and histories.
Matsuda was born and raised in Japan. She moved to New Zealand in 2001 and received her B.A in 2006 from Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology. She then moved to the United States and received her MFA degree from the University of Arizona in 2010. Her work has been exhibited in New Zealand, Japan, Bulgaria, and the United States. Matsuda received the 2008 International Sculpture Center Outstanding Students Achievement in Contemporary Sculpture Award, and 1st place in the Southwest graduate student competition, Crossing 2009. She also received an Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences Graduate Fellowship to the University of Arizona.
Alice Briggs: 2009
Alice Leora Briggs was the artist in residence from 2008-2009. She creates highly-detailed and haunting images using sgrafitto—a technique in which India ink covers a surface prepared with clay through which she scratches networks of lines to create masterful and complex drawings.
Alice spent her time at the Border Art Residency scratching beneath the surface of border dynamics, particularly the unrelenting violence against women that has been unresolved for decades. Much of the work during her residency was used to illustrate Dreamland: The Way Out of Juarez, authored by Charles Bowden and published by the University of Texas Press. She is currently enjoying a Guggenheim Fellowship in Eastern Europe.
Alice earned a BFA from Utah State University and both an MA and MFA from the University of Iowa. Her work has been shown around the United States and the world.
Grant Billingsley: 2013
Jessica Pizaña Roberts: 2014
