The current VCCA Fellows Council has elected five new members from a pool of 20 nominees. The newly elected members will serve through the autumn of 2012. They are: Loren Graham, poet, Helena, Montana; David Haynes, fiction writer, Dallas, Texas; Peggy Ingraham, writer, Alexandria, Virginia; Claire Lieberman, visual artist, Bloomington, Illinois; Koji Nakano, composer, Boston, Massachusetts. These five Fellows will join the current Council members who will serve through autumn of 2010: Karen Bell, photographer, New York, New York, chairperson; Kerry Dolan, writer, San Francisco, California, vice chairperson; Marion Held, sculptor, Montclair, New Jersey; Patricia Spears Jones, poet, Brooklyn, New York; Laura Kaminsky, composer, Bronx, New York; Anne LeClaire, writer, South Chatham, Massachusetts. These eleven Fellows will be the “voice of the Fellows” to the VCCA Board of Directors and administration. Among other goals, they will also work on behalf of the Fellows to address such issues

When Caroline Y. Lindemann, who graduated from Sweet Briar College in 1949, came across an exhibit of miniature finger paintings by VCCA Fellow Mary Ann Brandt at the Virginia Museum of Fine Art, she was mesmerized. Sadly, Caroline, who lives in Richmond, did not meet Mary Ann, who died in 2007. One of the nation's leading collectors of miniature books (she recently donated 13,000 to the University of Virginia), Caroline decided to pay tribute to this VCCA artist. Her new press, Cyclone Press, will publish "Mary Ann Brant," its first book, later this month. Written by Eileen Mott and edited by Caroline, it is appropriately diminutive in size. Letterpress printed, it includes several life size color illustrations. Mary Ann, who was in residence at the VCCA four times between 1983 and 1990, raised finger painting to a high art. It was during one of her VCCA residencies, Caroline tells us, that Mary Ann began to see miniature paintings within her paintings, and so began her