fauxtrots

A beautiful panoramic photo of a lake, with color-changing trees on the far side.

As I write this I'm ending my first day at a week-long artist residency in the Pocono Mountains. It's being held at a lakeside cabin within a nature sanctuary, the air has a crisp chill but isn't yet truly cold¹At least during the day, and the leaves are changing color. It's beautiful, and as much as I love #philly, it's nice to get out of the city for a bit.

I believe I first started thinking about trying to get a residency while reading Nat Welch's blogs about his experience. I've been doing more art lately as both a hobby and a way to stave off existential depression, but never considered a residency as an option. My initial idea of an artist residency was that you needed to already be established and have a body of work to be considered, and that's at least partially true - a lot of them did. I ended up searching around various sites looking for anything local-ish²If you're curious, check out Res Artis and the Artist Communities Alliance lists as a starting place., ended up applying here, and got accepted! I did have to submit a few sample pieces as a portfolio (which is why this site gained an art page a few months ago), but there wasn't any barrier around notability or recognition or anything.

Anyway~, I'm going to be spending the next week here walking around the woods, gazing out at the lake, and creating. I probably won't put a post up every day³Can't spend all my art time blogging!, but I'll do my best to document what I'm getting up to, for myself as much as any of you reading. I'll leave⁴Leaf you with this, my first study of the changing colors of fall.

An illustration of a red leaf, with the reference leaf in the background.

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Footnotes

1. At least during the day ↩

2. If you're curious, check out Res Artis and the Artist Communities Alliance lists as a starting place. ↩

3. Can't spend all my art time blogging! ↩

4. Leaf ↩