In 2012, the Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts invited back everyone who had been a former Artist-in-Residence. I am proud to say I was among this cohort and it was an amazing week of creativity and conversations. There are very few artist residencies that come with metals studio equipment. It made me wonder if I could organize something similar.
I spoke with Nick DeFord at Arrowmont and he told me that whole studios were available to groups. After determining that it would take fourteen other people to make this affordable, I started to ask people to join me. If they said no, I asked them who they thought I should ask. I needed pleasant humans who would say yes. The first group in 2015 included the following people in addition to myself: Anya Kivarkis, Lauren Mcadams Selden, Stephanie Voegele, Jill Gower, Yevgeniya Kaganovich, Motoko Furuhashi, Jennie Milner, Haley Bates, Mary Pearse, Cappy Counard, Natalie Macellaio, Becky McDonah, Phil Renato and Jennifer “Jeff” Ingalls. This became known as the Advance/Retreat. We spent a week together in the metals studio at Arrowmont. All the names were familiar, but I did not know everyone personally before the week commenced. It was a magical, productive, delightful week. We sang Karaoke. We all slept in the same house on campus and sat up late talking on the porch in rocking chairs. We talked about our work and lives. Afterward, we exhibited together a few times and used this network of new connections for projects.
In 2019 I started to plan for a second retreat to take place in 2020. Most of the original people were on board.
And then the pandemic hit.
How many times have you read that sentence it the past year?
This summer we were finally able to come together again. Four of the original Advance/Retreat members could not participate for various reasons so I once again reached out to my network for suggestions. The summer 2022 gathering was rebranded Advance/Retreat/Repeat and included the following individuals: Adam Hawk, Natalie Macellaio, Cappy Counard, Lauren Selden,. Jennie Milner, Jennifer “Jeff” Ingalls, Yevgeniya Kaganovich, Motoko Furuhashi, Haley Bates, Erica Meier, Ashley Buchanan, Mary Pearse and myself. For some, it was the largest gathering they had attended in years.
This time we wore masks in the studio, skipped the karaoke and continued the great talks on the porch. I hope people got what they needed from the week. I certainly did.
Maybe we will do another on in 2027 and call it Advance/Retreat/Retire?
Advance/Retreat/Repeat participants at Arrowmont 2022