Resident Artist Program Summer 2019 News

Silver City, Nevada - The Resident Artist Program in Silver City hosted remarkable visiting artists this summer from the United Kingdom, New York City, and Philadelphia.

Stewart Easton and Claire Scully of London sketched and photographed Silver City scenes while they were here in June. Claire, who is an illustrator and author, as well as an instructor at University of Brighton in England, was invited to speak during Carson City’s artists lecture series at the Brick. Stewart, who works in thread, ink, paint and digital, has shown his unique artwork at the V & A and Tate Modern in London, and the Ashmolean at Oxford University, as well as in galleries in New York, LA and beyond since he was last at the Resident Artist Program in 2016.

Philadelphia-based artist Morgan Craig toured historic mills in Silver City and the Comstock in July and hopes to complete new paintings based on what he saw here. We hope he’ll come back to show the new paintings. He was also invited to speak during Carson City’s artists lecture series this summer, and was interviewed by Joe McCarthy for a piece appearing in Nevada Capital News and KNVC radio. During the interview Morgan explained that he uses “painting as a tool to get people to question … what the 1%, corporations, and capitalists have done to this planet in the name of profit, with no moral compass whatsoever." Morgan Craig has received numerous awards for his work, including the Pollock Krasner Foundation Grant. From Silver City, he went immediately to a Residency in Zambia, Africa.

Playwright, opera librettist, and theater critic David Cote is based in New York City. His latest opera, Blind Justice, was sold out for 5 months and received glowing reviews. His opera libretti have been in operas at Nashville Opera, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Chicago Opera Theater and beyond. He's written companion books for several hit Broadway musicals, including Wicked. David was also invited to speak during Carson City’s artists lecture series, and was also interviewed by Joe McCarthy for a piece appearing in Nevada Capital News. While here, he offered playwriting workshops for locals, and contributed a sketch that skillfully satirized “the greed and delusions of companies trying to capitalize on the mythologies of the past.” He also began and completed his own play titled “S’Aint Joe” during his residency!

The Program was also delighted to host Siena College sociology professor Dr. Beverly Yuen Thompson this summer while she was working on her latest book. Her previous book is "Covered in Ink: Tattoos, Women and the Politics of the Body" (NYU Press, 2015). Her research as a sociologist centers on gender; drug policy; subcultures; and activism. From McCormick House, Dr. Thompson went immediately to Australia, and then to Hong Kong. She was quoted at length in a Sept. 2019 article. Albany, New York’s Times Union reporter Rebecca Carballo wrote, "While the protests [in Hong Kong] are a deterrent for some people to return, Beverly Thompson, a sociology professor, purposely scheduled her recent trip in the midst of the demonstrations. She’d read about the protest all summer long, but she wanted to see them for herself. The unity among the protesters and the turnout is what struck her the most...Thompson said she witnessed people from all different walks of life come together to protest.”