Tag: application

Summer 2020 Residency Call!

Sundress Academy for the Arts Now Accepting
Residency Applications for Summer 2020

Farmhouse image courtesy of former resident Christina Elia.

The Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is now accepting applications for short-term writing residencies in all genres—poetry, fiction, nonfiction, playwriting, screenwriting, journalism, academic writing, and more—for their summer residency period which runs from May 25 to August 23, 2020. These residencies are designed to give artists time and space to complete their creative projects in a quiet and productive environment.

Each residency costs $250/week, which includes a room of one’s own, access to our communal kitchen, bathroom, office, and living space, plus wireless internet access.

Residents will stay at the SAFTA farmhouse, located on a working farm on a 45-acre wooded plot in a Tennessee “holler” perfect for hiking, camping, and nature walks. The farmhouse is also just a half-hour from downtown Knoxville an exciting and creative city that is home to a thriving artistic community. SAFTA is ideal for writers looking for a rural retreat with urban amenities.

SAFTA’s residencies, which also include free access to workshops, readings, and events, offer a unique and engaging experience. Residents can participate in local writing workshops, lead their own workshops, and even have the opportunity to learn life skills like gardening and animal care.

For the 2020 summer residency period, SAFTA will be offering the following fellowships:

  • Women Who Submit Fellowship: one full fellowship plus $250 stipend for a writer who is parenting children under 18 and/or serving as full-time caregiver to an ailing family member
  • Writers of Color Fellowships: one full and one 50% fellowship for writers of color
  • Center for Writers Scholarship for Mississippi Graduate Students : one full fellowship which will go to a current and incoming graduate students at any college or university in Mississippi
  • Misty Upham Fellowship: one full fellowship for a survivor of sexual assault.

Please note in your application if you are applying for one of these fellowships. For all fellowship applications, the application fee will be waived for those who demonstrate financial need. Please state this in your application under the financial need section. Limited partial scholarships are also available to any applicant with financial need.

The application deadline for the summer residency period is February 1, 2020. Find out more about the application process at www.sundressacademyforthearts.com.

SAFTA Now Accepting Residency Applications for Spring 2020 with Fellowships for LGBTQIA+ Writers

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Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is thrilled to announce that they are now accepting applications for short-term artists’ residencies in creative writing, visual art, film/theater, music, and more. Each residency includes a room of one’s own as well as access to a communal kitchen, bathroom, office, and living space, plus wireless internet.

The length of a residency can range from one to three weeks. SAFTA is currently accepting applications for our spring residency period, which runs from December 23, 2019-May 24, 2020. The deadline for spring residency applications is September 15th, 2019.

lambda literarySAFTA will be pairing with Lambda Literary to offer two fellowships (one full fellowship and one 50% fellowship) for a week-long residency to LGBTQIA+ writers of any genre. Lambda believes Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer literature is fundamental to the preservation of our culture, and that LGBTQIA+ lives are affirmed when our stories are written, published and read. All applicants to the two fellowships must identify as LGBTQIA+. Partial scholarships are also available to any applicant with financial need.

This year’s judge will be Brynn Martin, a Kansas native living in Knoxville, where she brynn martinreceived her MFA in poetry from the University of Tennessee. She co-hosts Shitty First Drafts, a podcast made for and by writers. Her poetry has appeared in or is forthcoming from Contrary Magazine, Yes, Poetry, Rogue Agent, and Crab Orchard Review.

The SAFTA farmhouse is located on a working farm that rests on a 45-acre wooded plot in a Tennessee “holler” perfect for hiking and exploring. The farm is less than a half-hour from downtown Knoxville, a bustling, innovative city of 200,000 in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains, making SAFTA an ideal location for those looking for a rural get-away with access to urban amenities.

The residency bedrooms are 130 sq. ft. with a queen-size platform bed, closet, dresser, and desk. The communal kitchen is supplied with stove, refrigerator, and microwave plus plenty of cook- and dining-ware. The office and library have two working computers—one Mac, one PC. The library contains over 1,000 books with a particularly large contemporary poetry section and, thanks to The Wardrobe, many recent titles by women and nonbinary writers. The facility also includes a full-size working 19th century full-size letterpress with type, woodworking tools, and a 1930’s drafting table.

To apply for the Sundress Academy for the Arts residency, you will need the following:

-Application form (including artist’s statement and contact information for two references)
-CV or artist’s resume (optional)
-Artist sample (see website for more details on genre specifications)
-Application fee of $15 or $10 for current students (with student email) payable online*

For more information on this and other fellowships, visit our website: http://www.sundressacademyforthearts.com/ or find us on Facebook, under Sundress Academy for the Arts or on Twitter, @SundressPub

*Application fee will be waived for those applying for the Lambda Literary scholarship who demonstrate financial need. Please state this in your application under the financial need section.

DEVELOPMENT DIRECTORSHIP FOR SUNDRESS ACADEMY FOR THE ARTS

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An extension of Sundress Publications, a 501(c)3 nonprofit publication group founded in 2000, the Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is an artists’ residency on a 45-acre farm in Knoxville, Tennessee, that offers residencies to writers in all genres including literary, nonfiction, journalism, and academic. With two residency rooms and a dry cabin on site, we offer a rotating space for nationally recognized and emerging artists in multiple disciplines. SAFTA also hosts weekend workshops, a reading series, and yearly retreats.

This position will run for one year from your start date with a chance to be renewed the following year. The development director’s responsibilities includes working with a team of interns and other directors to research grant opportunities, draft potential grants, coordinate between SAFTA department heads, work with our budget office, and lead a team of two to four people to write, edit, and submit national, regional, and local grants.

Qualifications include:

  • Strong organizational, creative problem-solving, and written communication skills
  • Familiarity with online research
  • A keen eye for grammar, punctuation, and syntax
  • A passion for contemporary literature and community arts programs

Previous experience with arts administration and/or grant writing is greatly preferred. Applicants are welcome to telecommunicate and therefore are not restricted to living in the Knoxville area.

While this is an unpaid position, all directorships with SAFTA gain real-world experience with a nationally recognized press and arts organization while creating a portfolio of work for future employment opportunities. Directors will also be able to attend all workshops at the Sundress Academy for the Arts for free.

To apply, please send a resume and a brief cover letter detailing your interest in the position to Erin Elizabeth Smith at erin@sundresspublications.com Applications are due by August 15, 2019.

For more information, visit us at www.sundresspublications.com and www.sundressacademyforthearts.com. You may also check us out on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and more.

SUNDRESS ACADEMY FOR THE ARTS NOW ACCEPTING FALL RESIDENCY APPLICATIONS FOR WRITERS COOP

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The Sundress Academy for the Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is now accepting applications for short-term writers residencies during the fall residency period for our Writers Coop. These residencies are designed to give writers and artists time and space to complete their creative projects in a quiet and productive environment.

Open weeks for the summer and fall include August 19 – December 29, 2019. Residency weeks run from Monday to Sunday.

coop3.jpgSAFTA is located on a working farm that rests on a 45-acre wooded plot in a Tennessee “holler” perfect for hiking, camping, and nature walks. Located less than a half-hour from downtown Knoxville, an exciting and creative city of 200,00 in the foothill of the Great Smoky Mountains, SAFTA is an ideal location for those looking for a rural get-away with access to urban amenities.

The SAFTA Writers Coop is a 10×10′ dry cabin approximately a fourth of a mile from thecoop1.jpg
SAFTA farmhouse. This tiny house is furnished with a twin bed, a desk, a wood-burning stove, a deck that looks over the pasture and pond, as well as a personal detached outhouse. While the cabin has neither electricity nor running water, residents will have full access to the amenities at farmhouse as well as solitude from other residents to write in the rolling hills of East Tennessee.

coop2.jpgEach residency costs $150/week and includes your own private dry cabin as well as 24-hour access to the farmhouse amenities.

This year, SAFTA is excited to offer two fellowships for writers during the fall period. These fellowships will be fully funded, allowing writers to stay at the Writer’s Coop for free. Applications for these fellowships are due by August 1, 2019.

All other applications for this residency are free and rolling. Apply today to get preferred dates.

Find out more at www.sundressacademyforthearts.com.

 

Sundress Reading Series Seeks Applicants!

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The Sundress Reading Series is an award-winning literary reading series in the heart of Knoxville, TN, just miles from the Great Smoky Mountains. An extension of Sundress Publications and the Sundress Academy for the Arts, the Sundress Reading Series features nationally recognized writers in all genres from around the US while also supporting local and regional nonprofits.

We are currently curating our fall reading series schedule on October 13, November 10, and December 8, 2019. Our readings take place monthly on Sundays at 1PM at Hexagon Brewing Company.

 

To apply to read for the fall, send 6-8 pages of poetry or 8-15 pages of prose, a 100-word bio, CV, and preferred reading dates to sundresspublications@gmail.com. Please make sure the subject line reads “Reading Series Application.” Application deadline is August 15, 2019.

We will make every effort possible to contact those chosen by September 1, 2019. While we are currently unable to pay our readers, authors are given a discount on future SAFTA residencies and are encouraged to sell their own books and merchandise at the event.

Find our more or to view some of our past readers and schedules, visit us at: www.sundressacademyforthearts.com.

Sundress Academy for the Arts Now Accepting Applications for Residency Fellowship in Long-form Journalism/Nonfiction

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Sundress Academy for the Arts Now Accepting Applications
for Residency Fellowship in Long-form Journalism/Nonfiction

The Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is excited to announce that they are accepting applications for a new fellowship in long-form journalism and/or nonfiction. The Fourth Estate Residency fellowship comes with a two-week residency during the spring or summer residency periods as well as a $500 stipend.

In the age of anti-journalism and “fake news,” we believe it is more important than ever to give journalists and writers time to research, write, and revise work that delves into the events and issues of our time. Our group of ten writers (Camille Dungy, Eliza Griswold, Patrick Hicks, Ilyse Kusnetz (in memoriam), Kathryn Miles, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Brian Turner, Sholeh Wolpe, Elliott Woods, and Sunil Yapa) have joined together to make this possible. Although several of us work in writing disciplines outside of journalism, we believe it is crucial to support the work of journalists—especially in a time when the entire profession is under threat.

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This fellowship is intended to give writers space and time to continue to do this important and necessary work. Applicants may work in any journalistic medium—writing (traditional journalism or literary nonfiction), podcasting, vlogging, etc.

The SAFTA farmhouse is located on a working farm that rests on a 45-acre wooded plot in a Tennessee “holler” perfect for hiking, camping, and nature walks. Located less than a half-hour from downtown Knoxville, an exciting and creative city of 200,000 in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains, SAFTA is an ideal location for those looking for a rural get-away with access to urban amenities.

The residency bedrooms are 130 sq. ft. with queen-size platform bed, closet, dresser, and desk. There is also a communal kitchen supplied with stove, refrigerator, and microwave plus plenty of cook- and dining-ware. The office and library have two working computers—one Mac, one PC—with access to the Adobe Creative Cloud. The library contains over 800 books with a particularly large contemporary poetry section and, thanks to the Wardrobe, many recent titles by women and nonbinary writers. The facility also includes a full-size working 19th century full-size letterpress with type, woodworking tools, and a 1930’s drafting table.

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SAFTA is currently accepting applications for our spring/summer residency period, which runs from December 31st to August 11th, 2019. The deadline for The Fourth Estate Residency fellowship applications is September 1st, 2018.

To apply for the Sundress Academy for the Arts residency, you will need the following:

  • Application form (including artist’s statement and contact information for two references)
  • CV or artist’s resume (optional)
  • Artist sample (see website for more details on genre specifications)
  • Application fee of $15 or $10 for current students (with student email) payable online*

Please also let us know if you would like to be considered for a residency even if you are not awarded this particular fellowship. For the spring, we also have fellowships for LGBTQIA writers; for the summer, we offer fellowships for writers and artists of color.

For more information, visit our website: http://www.sundressacademyforthearts.com/

*Application fee will be waived for those applying who demonstrate financial need. Please state this in your application under the financial need section.

SAFTA Now Accepting Fall Residency Applications for Writers Coop

Sundress Academy for the Arts Now Accepting
Fall Residency Applications for Writers Coop

The Sundress Academy for the Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is now accepting applications for short-term writers residencies during the fall residency period for our new Writers Coop during the weeks of August 27 – December 30, 2018. These residencies are designed to give writers and artists time and space to complete their creative projects in a quiet and productive environment.

SAFTA is located on a working farm that rests on a 45-acre wooded plot in a Tennessee “holler” perfect for hiking, camping, and nature walks. Located less than a half-hour from downtown Knoxville, an exciting and creative city of 200,00 in the foothill of the Great Smoky Mountains, SAFTA is an ideal location for those looking for a rural get-away with access to urban amenities.

The SAFTA Writers Coop is a 10×10′ dry cabin approximately a fourth of a mile from the SAFTA farmhouse. This tiny house is furnished with a twin bed, a desk, a wood-burning stove, a deck that looks over the pasture and pond, as well as a personal detached outhouse. While the cabin has neither electricity nor running water, residents will have full access to the amenities at farmhouse as well as solitude from other residents to write in the rolling hills of East Tennessee.

Each residency costs $150/week and includes your own private dry cabin as well as 24-hour access to the farmhouse amenities.

Applications for this residency are free and rolling. The following weeks are still available: August 27 – September 2; September 3-9; September 10 – 16; September 17- 23; September 24 – 30; October 29 – November 4; December 17 – 23; December 24 – 30.

Find out more at www.sundressacademyforthearts.com.

A Week in the Writers Coop

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I was completely unsure what to expect when Erin Elizabeth Smith offered me the chance to test out the new Writer’s Coop at the Sundress Academy for the Arts at Firefly Farms.  I had been to several events at the farm itself, and, like most who stay at the farm, I was charmed by the colorful murals of mermaids, flowers, and Sylvia Plath, the shelves full of chapbooks, and, of course, the friendly animals (Jayne, the enormous resident donkey and professional selfie-taker in particular).  Though Erin warned me that the coop was still something of a work-in-progress and part of my job was to identify what still needed to be done, I arrived at Firefly Farms with high hopes of a good time full of productive writing.  I am happy to say that the Writer’s Coop did not disappoint.

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To access the coop, one has two options: you can have someone drive you on a four-wheeler, or you can walk the dirt and gravel path that winds behind Firefly Farms. The walk itself was quite easy; maybe a five minute jaunt when sober or ten when I had some beers down at the farm while getting to know the week’s residents. At the top of a small hill, the path widens and a tiny cabin appears.  Indeed, while the Coop started its life housing chickens, the Writer’s Coop resembles a charming re-creation of a log cabin that you might find in a museum more than anything else.

Erin and Joe, anticipating the needs of the future residents like myself, have included all the necessities: a front and back porch for catching the breeze, a comfortable bed, and, of course, a bottle opener mounted just outside the door.  The Coop even has its own outhouse close by.  Though I am the type of person who is normally horrified by going to the bathroom in outhouses or Port-a-Potties, I found the outhouse at the Coop to be fastidiously clean and completely devoid of smell.

I found my time at the Coop so enjoyable that the first morning, despite my hunger and need for a shower, I found myself lingering, writing poems and catching up on reading rather than making my way down to the farmhouse.  If you are like me and you work best in silence with few distractions, the Coop is the best possible place to write.  Something about feeling completely alone in nature without even the sound of passing cars really focused me.  I wrote five poems in the space of one afternoon while there.

I would recommend the Writer’s Coop to anyone who values alone time, peace and quiet, privacy, and affordability while still having options to commune with other authors (and play with adorable animals). Though I was lucky enough to test out the Coop, I will likely apply for my own residency in the future.

The Sundress Academy for the Arts is now accepting applications for fall residencies for the Writer’s Coop! Applications are free and rolling!

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Chloe Hanson is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Tennessee. She earned her MA and BA from Utah State University, where she also helped to establish and direct the Science Writing Center. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in several journals, including Public Pool, Off the Coast, and Driftwood Press. While she’s procrastinating her homework, she can often be found with a beer in her hand and her dog, Simon, by her side. She is the current Staff Director at the Sundress Academy for the Arts.

Now Accepting Fall Writer’s Coop Residency Applications


The Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is now accepting applications for short-term writers residencies during the fall residency period for our new Writers Coop during the weeks of August 14th to December 31st, 2017. These residencies are designed to give artists time and space to complete their creative projects in a quiet and productive environment.

SAFTA is located on a working farm that rests on a 45-acre wooded plot in a Tennessee “holler” perfect for hiking, camping, and nature walks. Located less than a half-hour from downtown Knoxville, an exciting and creative city of 200,000 in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains, SAFTA is an ideal location for those looking for a rural get-away with access to urban amenities.

The SAFTA Writers Coop is a 10×10′ dry cabin approximately a fourth of a mile from the SAFTA farmhouse. This tiny house is furnished with a twin bed, a desk, a wood-burning stove, a deck that looks over the pasture and pond, as well as a personal detached outhouse. While the cabin has neither electricity nor running water, residents will have full access to the amenities at farmhouse as well as solitude from other residents to write in the rolling hills of East Tennessee.

Each residency costs $150/week and includes your own private dry cabin as well as 24-hour access to the farmhouse amenities.

 

The application deadline for the fall residency period is rolling. All application fees have been waived for applications for the Writers Coop.

Find out more at www.sundressacademyforthearts.com.

Applying to the MFA: Known Knowns and the Importance of Place

If your application process is anything like mine, you’ll end up doing a lot of compatibility analysis (Figure 1). I’m only slightly dicking around. I didn’t actually crunch numbers like that, but the concept of compatibility was at the forefront of my mind when applying to creative writing programs—so was uglycrying and giving up on my current thesis when I started getting my rejections (Figure 2), so take all this cum grano salis. I’ve spent the past 2 years in a master’s program at Mizzou studying geography, and applying to a second round of graduate schools was no easier than the first.

Figure 1.

Chris Petruccelli Figure 1
That said, the best piece of advice I received when applying to geography programs was to apply to schools in cities I’d actually want to live in. I did not heed that advice on my first go around. To be clear, I love Mizzou, and my experience in the geography department has been amazing; however, take a gander at a map, find where Columbia, Missouri is and imagine having no car—only a bike. Word. That shit sucks. And even if I had a car, #whatever.

Having learned my lesson, applying to MFAs was equally dependent on the location of the program as the quality of the program itself. I knew I wouldn’t produce as much solid writing living anywhere in the Midwest compared to living and writing in places such as Fairbanks, AK or Nashville, TN. Hell, University of Alaska Fairbanks’s motto is “Naturally inspiring.” I dig that. Nashville has hot chicken—no further inspiration required. Ultimately, I knew I could probably live and write in three places: 1) Areas close to mountains/vast expanses of water; 2) Cities > 150,000 people; 3) Almost anywhere in the South.

Figure 2.

Chris Petruccelli Figure 2

But this isn’t about my lack of love for the Midwest, which in all honesty, is kind of cool. Another aspect driving me towards the MFA track is the fact that I no longer have any time for my creative writing. In the last several months, I’ve written one poem and that ain’t right. I love dendroecology, hiking up mountains and conducting challenging scientific research, but doing all that (as well as taking classes and fulfilling teaching assistant duties) in a span of two years and trying to write creatively has got me fried. Science and writing in tandem is possible, but in doing both, one is bound to take precedence while the other suffers. Right now, the writing must come first.

Picking up and moving to a far off place is difficult and expensive. But after living, studying and writing in Missouri, it’s foolish for me to not be where I want to be—a known knowns sort of thing. I’ll be moving to Fairbanks to work on an MFA at UAF after graduation after a quick stint back in Tennessee. I’m looking forward to holin’ up in a dry cabin after a day of skiing, hauling water from Fox Spring and finally sitting down at a desk to write as the aurora borealis does what it does in the sky.

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Chris Petruccelli Chris Petruccelli‘s poetry can be found in Connotation Press, Rappahannock Review, RomComPom, and elsewhere. His chapbook Action at a Distance is available at etchingspress.org. In his free time Chris enjoys drinking whiskey and smoking cigarettes with older women.