Artist Residency

For a very long time, I’ve been wanting to host an Artist Residency at Spring Bird for artists, writers, and makers who are longing to have the time and space to make! I know how critical this cottage and woodland was to me in the years of having young kids. I rarely had any time to create alone. My spirit would be continually renewed with each visit — enough to feed me for months.

I want to pay forward what has been so generously been given to us by offering Spring Bird’s annual Artist Residency Program!

Spring Bird’s Artist Residency is one week or 6 nights spent over 3 weekends for an artist, writer, or a maker and their friend to finish a project that they have been aching to finish. The Artist/Writer/Maker will be able to stay at the cottage at no cost for the allotted time and be free to make whatever is proposed in the application. The point of the residency is to reconnect with your project, finish it, and connect with nature and with your creative self.

Please see below for more information about the residency and how to apply.

Deadline for the application is: March 31st, 2025. You will have one year to use your residency.

See Spring Bird Cottage for Amenities and Specifications of Spring Bird Artist Residency location.

Timeline
one week or 3 weekends of Friday through Sunday (6 nights total)

To be completed within 12 months of being awarded

Occupancy
one or two people

Where
Spring Bird’s Cottage located in a wooded property in Dundee, Illinois,
40 miles northwest of Chicago.

Objectives
To have time and space to finish working on a project that you have been meaning to finish, e.g., a quilt, book, painting, album, etc.

To have time alone or with a good friend.

To connect with nature in a cozy cottage in a woodland.

To connect with oneself in a retreat setting.

Who Qualifies?
This residency is open to anyone 18 and older who is an artist, writer, or a maker of things.

Terms:
Artist will work to complete or attempt to complete the proposed project during the 6 night stay at the cottage.

Artist, if active on social media, will use social media to talk about the experience at least 3 times tagging #springbird #springbirdresidency on each post (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and/or personal blog). Any blogs will link to Spring Bird’s website springbird.land

Artist will have access to these supplies if requested in application: sewing machine, iron, ironing board, light table, acrylic paint, colored pencils, watercolor palettes.

Artist will be responsible for bringing the rest of their supplies and materials.

Artist will agree to being featured in a Spring Bird Blog Post and on Spring Bird’s social media.

Artist will agree to have work photographed for marketing purposes.

Deadline to Apply
March 31, 2025
Notification Date
April 30, 2025

Spring Bird Artist Residency Application

Photos of Work

If it applies to your project, please email 1 -3 photos of your proposed project to [email protected]

Make the subject line of your email read: “lastname_residency”

The 2024 Artist in Residence:

Stephanie Sailer

“The intention of this project is to explore the surrounding forest and forage for small, unassuming forms easily overlooked. Through the materials of felt and crochet, I will create enlarged versions with surrealist alterations. Similar to the forgotten aspects of ourselves, the pieces will take on a new life, transformed beyond the original form and the hands producing it.”

www.stephaniesailer.com

Follow on social media: @stephaniesailerart

The 2023 Artist in Residence:

Atoy Spates

Atoy intends to use her residency to explore deep writing and intentional resting while also sharing her retreat space with other creatives.

www.atoiglennette.com

Follow on social media: @atoi.glennette

The 2023 Artist in Residence:

Rachel Davis

Rachel plans on exploring the origins of color by composing a textile record of her natural plant dyes.

https://www.artbumble.com/

Follow on social media: @art_bumble

The 2022 Artist in Residence:

Erin Cramer

Erin will be using her residency to design her workshop: Art as Spiritual Practice through Papermaking which she will be teaching this fall.

www.erincramerart.com

Follow on social media: @erincramerart

The 2021 Artist Residency Recipients:

Anna De Leon, Cherylyn Gnadt, and Janelle O’Malley

Anna will be working on a series of personal essays exploring physical and mental health.

Follow Anna De Leon:

Instagram: @a_e_deleon

Cherylyn will be applying her nature observations to linocut carvings that will become part of a sketchbook guide designed to explore one’s own healing and finding one’s voice.

Janelle will be working with large scale paper making for painted sculptures that will investigate nostalgia and trauma, matrilineal communities and feminist thought, food disparity, and ethnographic connections.