The Lanesboro Arts BIPOC Artist Residency Program launched with a pilot program in fall 2022/winter 2023, supporting five artists in residence. The Pilot Program was a suggestion of the BIPOC Artist Advisory Committee, in order for Lanesboro Arts to launch this new program with space and time to be intentional, responsive, and invite feedback before launching the program publicly.

In addition to feedback on lodging amenities, application process, and more, the Pilot Program artists also offered testimonials for future artists to watch or read for additional context. Below is a summary of the written feedback. Here is a link to a video testimonial from Mike Hoyt.

Feedback for Other Artists:

• The option of the cohort model nurtures collaborative work with other artists throughout the residency; thus, this allows for artists to work with other artists to come up with potential ideas.
• Application is seen as approachable, simple, straightforward, and easy.
• The two-week residency is a good option for those who can’t take a month off, although it goes quickly!
• This residency opportunity is dynamic in the way that since different artists have different goals, their focus is able to change throughout the duration of their stay.
• Because no product is expected at the end of the residency, this program allows artists to put their energy into what they feel is necessary—whether that creative endeavor is producing something tangible or not.
• The accommodation [art loft] was cozy and provided ample space, especially for one person!
• The staff makes you feel cared for, especially as things were well-organized and well-prepared.

PILOT YEAR 2022-23 ARTISTS IN RESIDENCE

Xiaolu Wang is a documentary filmmaker, curator, and translator born in the Hui Muslim Autonomous Region of China, whose practice is based in the mapping of interiority, with the use of video, poetry, memory, translations, and a decolonial lens. They contributed translations to journals including 單讀. Besides being a practicing cinephilia, they occasionally host podcasts, and frequently read Tao Te Ching. Their work has been generously supported by Metropolitan Regional Arts Council of Minnesota, Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University, Jerome Foundation, International Documentary Association (IDA), APIA MN Film Collective, UnionDocs, and The On Being Project. They live on occupied Dakota homeland (present day Minneapolis) with two cats, Marvin and Moto, who sleep on separate couches.

R Yun Matea* is a moving image artist based in Minneapolis, on Dakota and Anishinaabe land. She was raised in California and Guatemala. Her practice in video and 16mm film is multimodal and research-based, and investigates race and labor, disease, and sites of historical and psychosocial trauma. R Yun is a recipient of the McKnight Media Artist Fellowship; Jerome Foundation Film, Video and Digital Production Grant; and University of Minnesota Libraries’ Archives and Special Collections Olson Innovation Artist in Residence Award. She earned her MFA in Film & Media Arts from Temple University and her BA in Geography from UC Berkeley. She has taught moving image studies and production at University of the Arts in Philadelphia, University of California at Santa Cruz, Minneapolis College of Art & Design and Carleton College.

Screenings and exhibitions of her work include: Center for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow; REDCAT Gallery, Los Angeles; Ghebaly Gallery, Los Angeles; Galerija Nova, Zagreb; Souvenirs from Earth International TV Project, Cologne; Raum für Projektion, Bergen, Olso & Buenos Aires; Katherine E. Nash Gallery, Minneapolis; PAPA Projects, St. Paul; Flaten Art Museum, Minnesota; Light Industry, Brooklyn; Mind TV/Media Independence, Philadelphia; Stella Elkins Tyler Gallery, Philadelphia; Philadelphia Film Festival, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia; Wits School of the Arts, Johannesburg; Festival Images Contre Nature, Marseille; Berlinale Talent Campus Editing Studio, Berlin.

[*formerly Keagy]

Mary Prescott is a Thai-American interdisciplinary artist, composer and pianist based in Minneapolis and New York City who explores the foundations and facets of identity and social conditions through experiential performance. She aims to foster understanding and create pathways for change by voicing emotional and human truths through artistic investigation and dissemination.

Prescott’s output includes several large-scale interdisciplinary works, improvised music, an immersive multimedia chamber opera, a 365-day sound journal, film music, as well as solo and chamber concert works.

As Co-Founder and inaugural Artistic Director of the Lyra Music Festival at Smith College, Prescott was named a New York Foundation for the Arts Emerging Leader. She has served on faculty at the Goppisberger Music Festival in Switzerland, the Louisiana Chamber Music Institute, and is a Teaching Artist with American Composers Orchestra.

Prescott holds degrees from the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities, and Manhattan School of Music.