Scott MacLeod's "Spectacularly Unsuccessful Writer's Residency" in Silver City, Nevada

Following is Scott MacLeod's beautifully written summary of his time at the Resident Artist Program in Silver City in the Spring of 2016. Photo credits: Scott MacLeod and Quest Lakes:

"Well, this has been a spectacularly unsuccessful writer's residency. I came to Silver City to isolate myself and write about some of the more exciting moments of my past, but I ended up just creating yet more exciting moments in the present.

Instead of being able to hole up in McCormick House and ignore a bleak, wintery locale populated by aloof eccentrics, I found myself in the middle of an emerging springtime, drawn into lively interactions with fascinating, generous residents who were eager to talk with me, show me around, and help me accomplish what became my overriding obsession: to build as many found-object sailing ship sculptures/models as I could in the six weeks I was here.

Together with about a dozen local full-time, part-time and occasional collaborators, I built the USS Silver Clipper, a three-masted schooner that is a gift from its makers to the City of Silver. I hope that it brings pleasure when you view it here and pride when it's exhibited in other locations next year.

Alone, I built another three-masted schooner that I eventually decided to name the USS Bob McKinney, because that's what these kinds of namings are supposed to do: help us remember people and events that, for one reason or another, should not be forgotten. One week before I left, with the generous help of a neighbor, I "sailed" that ship up into the hills and set it free to wander (metaphorically) the landscape that sheltered Bob McKinney for years. That neighbor shall remain nameless, to protect against curious inquiries about that ship's location.

I also half-built a third ship, the USS Peter W. Blethen, named after my good friend from college days in Colorado. Pete made a good life for himself in Minnesota, with lots of kids and grandkids, but died too young, ie. 60, ie. my age, of brain cancer. Again, the making and naming are essentially acts of loving and remembering. I will bring this ship back home to Oakland CA and finish it there this summer.

I'd built a couple of these sailing ship things before but hadn't realized how apt and adaptable this type of project would be in this type of situation. I'm now looking forward to trying to build ships together with other people in other places. Though it will be hard to find other places with as much readily-available crap - I mean: raw materials - as Silver City, and probably harder to find other places with people as interesting and generous as those who worked with me here these past six weeks.

PHOTO OF FRED SWANSON

I also got inspired to start a new but related project: I started making ghost towns and putting them up in the hills. The shacks and cabins and forts that make up these ghost towns are land-locked cousins of the sailing ships; they are not accurate or exactly to scale, but are somewhat abstract, ramshackle sculptures that hopefully evoke the forlorn mystique of a bygone world of people not entirely unlike us: eccentric, generous, tragic, joyful, alive and, eventually, dead and forgotten.

Our own pasts and presents overlap and intertwine with those of everyone we meet, sometimes creating confusion as contradictory desires and fears and points of view clash. The current state of live, streaming technology is allowing all of us, world-wide, to clash and fear and be confused all day long over the internet, without giving us many resources for resolving those anxieties and antagonisms. I treasure my time spent in Silver City partly because it will always remind me how valuable and satisfying it is to work together with others, strangers in the morning and comrades by evening, face to face and shoulder to shoulder in common cause. Just for the sheer pleasure of it really. I thank all of you, even those of you I didn't meet, for making Silver City a special place and I wish you all the best in the future and in the everlasting present.

Scott MacLeod

Thank you:

Quest Lakes, Fred Swanson, Theo McCormick, Molly Allander, Las Swanson, Susie Crowley, Cyndy Etchegoin, Sheree Rose, Theo McCormick, Johne Behner, Mylo McCormick, Renate Victor, Karen Kreyeski, Bob Elston, Henry Park, Matt Elms, Greg Melton, Will Rose, Cashion Callaway, Lila Lindsay, Brittanie Mullings, Sharon Rosse, Glenn Clemmer, Chad Sorg, Bill Burnaugh/Capitol City Loans, Tony/Nifty Thrifty, Healthy Communities Coalition & the Resident Artist Program in Silver City, St. Mary's Art Center, and Marielle Toll.

Acclaimed Photographer Frances Melhop at the Resident Artist Program in Silver City in August 2016

Silver City, Nevada - Narrative, story-telling visual artist Frances Melhop, voted “One of the World's 200 Best Advertising Photographers 2009/2010″ by Luerzers Archive, will bring her skills and talents to the Resident Artist Program in Silver City this summer. She'll set up a temporary studio at the Silver City School House during August 2016, photographing some of the Comstock’s longtime residents for a 2017 exhibition at the Haldan Art Gallery at Tahoe. As part of the project, portrait subjects are also able to record personal or Comstock stories to accompany their photos. Silver City native Mary Works Covington, known for her film Rockin’ at the Red Dog and for her work as assistant sound and/or dialog editor for films such as Titanic, Saving Private Ryan and The English Patient, will provide technical assistance with the recordings.

Based in Australia for a decade, then in Milan, Italy for the next decade, Frances is well known in Europe and the South Pacific as a creator of extraordinary and unique imagery in the fashion and advertising arena. Her photographs have appeared in European magazines such as Vogue Italia, Vogue France, British Vogue, and Glamour, to Face, ID, Purple, Marie Clarie Italia, Elle, Vogue Pelle, Vogue Gioello, and D della Repubblica.

Photographs from Frances' fairytale inspired series- which she describes as "an imaginary world of tall-tales, dreams, games of scale, surreality and story-telling" - have been exhibited in Paris, Cannes, Rome, Albuquerque, Virginia City, Reno, etc.

Now living in Nevada, Frances has continued to produce outstanding work on the Comstock and beyond, including portraits of Virginia City residents, and panoramic portraits of the Burning Man arts and music festival. She explains that as a resident of Nevada for the last 5 years, her attention has turned to "portraiture and its geographical and biographical content."

Born in New Zealand, Frances attended the University of Canterbury where she studied Psychology, German language, Philosophy and Political Science, then the Sydney Institute of Technology, Australia where she studied technical photography for three years. With courses soon to be completed at the University Nevada Reno School of Fine Art, she plans to teach at the university level in the U.S.

"Frances has also been the inspiration for the design of the visiting artist program here in Silver City," said Quest Lakes, director of the resident artist program in Silver City. "While director at St. Mary's Art Center in Virginia City, Northern Nevada Development Authority named Frances "Innovator of the Year" within a 5 county region. The well-deserved award stemmed from her extraordinary work through the Art Center. She introduced new talent to the region, showcased Nevada artists, and found grants and donations for programming, artists and restoration of the historic building. During her time at St. Mary's, she revitalized the Art Center with a new website, a high quality Resident Artist program, and curation of more than 30 exhibitions each year. She's a role model for some of the things my husband [Theo McCormick] and I would like to develop at the Program in Silver City."

What is the Resident Artist Program? A multi-faceted visiting artist program is developing in the small but vibrant community of Silver City, providing a venue for those from other parts of the U.S. and the world to engage with the community and the region through the arts. Silver City is located on the Comstock, within one of the nation's largest federally designated historic landmarks. Recently declared an "Arts and Culture Resources Production Center," Silver City is already home to a surprising number of Nevada's highly productive artists, musicians, photographers, writers, actors, artisans, historians, and archaeologists. Those creating in the performing, visual, media, or literary arts are being invited to reside for up to 4 months at McCormick House, a geodesic dome designed in the 1970s by Nevada artist Jim McCormick. As part of the residency, visiting artists offer free public performances, exhibitions, readings, workshops, etc. for the Northern Nevada community.

Acknowledgments: The project is sponsored through the Resident Artist Program of Silver City, with added assistance from photography interns Marielle Toll, Cora Jeffreys, and Ava Covington, and additional support from Healthy Communities Coalition of Lyon and Storey.