Maryland State Arts Council Artist RegistryCall for Writers and Artists21st Annual Critics’ Residency Program

Postmark/Delivery deadline: July 15, 2006


ANNOUNCING MAP’S 21st Annual Critics in Residence,
Eleanor Heartney and Irving Sandler.

Eleanor Heartney is a Contributing Editor to Art in America and Artpress and received the College Art Association’s Frank Jewett Mather Award for distinction in art criticism in 1992. Her books include: Critical Condition: American Culture at the Crossroads (1997), Postmodernism (2001), Postmodern Heretics: The Catholic Imagination in Contemporary Art (2004), and Defending Complexity: Art, Politics and the New World Order (2006.) Heartney is currently working on a survey of contemporary art from the 1980s to the present, which will be published by Phaidon in 2007. Since 2003, she has been Co-President of AICA-USA, the American section of the International Art Critics Association.

Irving Sandler has been called the premiere art critic of our time, as he has maintained a passionate engagement with contemporary artists for more than fifty years, while keeping his finger on the pulse of what is happening at any particular moment. Starting in 1954, Sandler began taking copious notes of conversations with artists, or among artists, during informal gatherings at the Club, the Cedar Street Tavern, or in artists' studios, and soon after, became the director of the Tanager Gallery, the Program Chair for the Artists' Club, and a reviewer for Art News and Art International, establishing two roles that he would fill for the rest of his career: supporter of emergent artist groups, and advocate critic. A third role, that of professor, emerged in the 1960s. In the 1970s, Sandler began writing books that synthesized his collection of interviews and reviews into broad surveys of contemporary art, including The Triumph of American Painting: A History of Abstract Expressionism (1970), The New York School: The Painters and Sculptors of the Fifties (1978), American Art of the 1960s (1988), and Art of the Postmodern Era: From the Late 1960s to the Early 1990s (1996), and A Sweeper-Up After Artists: A Memoir (2004). In addition, Sandler has written monographs on individual artists, including Alex Katz and Mark Di Suvero.


For artist and writer applications, the postmark/delivery deadline is July 15, 2006.


Artist and writer candidates will be eligible for selection by the critic(s) in residence to participate in studio visits and workshops in autumn 2006. The program culminates with a group exhibition and published catalogue of artwork and critical essays in spring 2007. The 21st Annual Critics’ Residency Program will take place between late summer 2006 and late spring 2007, and is intended to promote the work of area writers and artists, while advancing their careers and providing artists, writers and audiences with a venue and forum to address critical issues of contemporary art.

Applicants must reside within a 60-mile drive from MAP and provide their own transportation to and from workshops and studio visits. To verify mileage, we suggest that you use MAPQUEST at www.mapquest.com.

Download the Prospectus and Application