VCCA’s 2017 Wachtmeister Award for Excellence in the Arts winner, Emily Rapp Black will be in residence at VCCA in September. Selected from a highly competitive field of international applicants, Emily will receive, in addition to the a fully-funded residency, reimbursement of travel costs and honorarium.  Emily is the author of  Poster Child: A Memoir , and  The Still Point of the Turning World , which was a New York Times bestseller and a finalist for the PEN USA Award in Nonfiction. She was educated at Harvard University, St. Olaf College, Trinity College-Dublin, and the University of Texas-Austin where she was a James A. Michener Fellow. In addition to VCCA, Emily has received fellowships from Yaddo, the Jentel Arts Foundation, Fundacion Valparaiso, the Fine Arts Work Center, and Bucknell University, where she was the Philip Roth Writer-in-Residence. Emily's work has appeared in  Vogue, The New York Times ,  Los Angeles Ti...

Being half American is very dear to me especially when that ties me to Virginia, where my Mother was born in Lynchburg. I've always felt at home there especially as an escape from the frenetic pace of London so you couldn't have a better location for an artistic retreat. At the end of a long winding driveway, tucked amongst lush woodland with the Blue Ridge Mountains on the horizon you'll find the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts (VCCA). Since I've been collaborating with them on an auction lot to raise funds during their Fête Champêtre on Saturday April 29th 2017, I was delighted to have the chance to look round their grounds, hear how things are run and even meet a couple of their residents last time I was in town. “One of the leading artists communities in the world with locations in Amherst, Virginia and Auvillar, France, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts (VCCA) has as its mission advancing the arts by providing creative space in which our bes...

Staring at a stucco wall struck by sunlight, covered in vines, I find myself beside a river, beneath a hill, in the agricultural belly of France. It’s a rare opportunity to briefly live and work in this warm light, surrounded by a thousand kinds of patina. For a month I have a residency at Moulin à Nef in Auvillar. It is the French outpost of the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. VCCA is one of the midwives who delivered me into my current state as an artist. The opportunity to live and work in their community for the first time was a watershed. I am hoping that Moulin à Nef rolls over me in as powerful a way. My studio is tall and wide with 6 foot windows and mottled walls stained a pale jade. I have suffered all the vagaries of travel in the last five days with canceled flights, lost luggage and bad rental car contracts. The first thing I plugged into an outlet blew a fuse and then I turned around and slipped on a throw rug. Five days after leaving home, I’m still wearing the...

Swing, Boat, Table What Hanno made of wood this year: a swing, a boat, a table. He doesn’t believe he’s made art this year; the swing, the boat, the table are objects he made to invite those he loves to sit down. Not objects people in rooms walk around, regard in boredom or awe while locked at the knee– a few vaguely yearning to float to the sea, break bread with friends, rise through the air– a few vaguely yearning–and not knowing why– to sit in a tree.                                      –Elizabeth Seydel Morgan I remember Hanno Ahrens as larger than life: tall, commanding, and generous. He was a no-nonsense guy who lived large and his wood sculpture filled that large space. His work was also commanding, yet elegant, deeply in tune with its material, and perfec...

“I invented the one breath, one line method during my last year of graduate school,” says Theresa Antonellis referring to her unusual drawing process. “I wanted to find a way to synthesize everything I was thinking and learning before I started my MFA.” For many years prior, Theresa taught yoga and massage both of which involve a lot of breath work. Finding herself in the pressure cooker-environment of graduate school, she wanted to incorporate the two calming disciplines into her practice. That’s when she started experimenting with breath-generated mark making. “I was making marks based on the range of motion in my arm, and I came to settle on this very controlled one breath, one line and range of motion in the wrist or the arm plus the length of the drawing implement.“ At VCCA, Theresa was working on a series of line drawings made with a ballpoint pen and larger works made with oakgall ink on Japanese paper. The work shares an affinity, but the effect is quite different.  ...

What better place to write poetry than Southwest France? Auvillar is a jewel of a village, one of France’s “100 most beautiful villages.” Truly, there’s nothing that’s not poetry in our village. As the light strikes it, the Garonne changes its appearance every time you look. The food is unbeatable, the wine is superb, the people are friendly. Oh yes, we write some poetry, too!  This is our 9 th year and many of our poets have published the poetry they’ve written in the workshop. Afternoon demos in French cooking and photography add resonance to our workshop title, “O Taste and See: Writing the Senses in Deep France.” Workshop leader, Dr. Marilyn Kallet, Nancy Moore Goslee Professor of English at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, is the author of 17 books, including The Love That Moves Me , poetry from Black Widow Press. To contact Marilyn Kallet: mkallet@utk.edu

Attention Composers!  Here’s your chance to work with composers Raphaël Cendo and Philippe Leroux and premiere a new work with the Ecce Ensemble. This year's Etchings program takes place from June 26th to July 3rd, 2017. For more information and to apply: http://www.eccearts.com/etchings_2017 http://www.eccearts.com/etchings_composition_info VCCA Fellow John Aylward, began the Etchings Festival in 2009, collaborating with VCCA at its Moulin à Nef Studio Center in Auvillar, France. VCCA's wish to have an international program that would further its mission of arts advocacy combined with John’s desire to create a positive environment for young emerging composers, where they would develop their craft through honest, frank interactions with each other. In a hyperactive Internet culture, it is more and more a unique experience to retreat to a quiet place to cultivate your art in a community of other passionate artists. To be influenced by such a community...