Nona Faustine, Demeter's Morning, Prospect Park 2018 pigment print from digital negative
BAXTER ST FAMILY RESIDENCY AT STONELEAF RETREAT
We are excited to announce Nona Faustine as the inaugural awardee of the Baxter St Family Residency at STONELEAF RETREAT. The new two-week program, starting in July, provides lens-based artists who are also mothers with an unrestricted grant of $2,500, focused studio time, one-on-one critiques with members of Baxter St’s Art Advisory Board, and family accommodations on STONELEAF’s 22-acre property in New York’s Catskill Mountains. The residency is a partnership between Baxter St, a 137-year-old organization renowned for its critical support of emerging lens-based artists, and STONELEAF, an artist residency and creative space for women and families, and is made possible by the generous support of 7|G Foundation and the Howard & Sarah D. Solomon Foundation.
"As a single mother dedicated to both my family and my practice as a photographer and visual artist, it is a great pleasure to be recognized and supported by STONELEAF and Baxter St through this residency," said Nona Faustine, who will attend with her daughter, Queen.
The Baxter St Family Residency at STONELEAF RETREAT grew out of conversations Baxter St President Michi Jigarjian and STONELEAF Co-Founder Helen Toomer had regarding the increased difficulties of working and parenting during a pandemic. As working parents, Jigarjian and Toomer wanted to provide time, space, and support to artists who are juggling families, artistic practice, and, often, a day job, and simply do not have the time or resources to do it all.
“While the traditional residency model of escaping to a bucolic environment to singularly focus on artistic practice can be a well-intentioned dream, for most artists who are also mothers, leaving family behind is often not an option,” said Michi Jigarjian. “The Baxter St Family Residency is intended to drive home the notion that motherhood and artistic practice do not have to be mutually exclusive.”
“We’ve admired Nona’s work for years, and are excited for STONELEAF to provide her and her family with a nourishing time to rest and create,” said Helen Toomer. “We’re honored to be collaborating with Baxter St to increase the support of artists with children, which feels especially urgent now, during such a difficult time.”
The Baxter St Family Residency at STONELEAF RETREAT continues Baxter St and STONELEAF’s shared commitment to serving the evolving needs of their artistic communities. Artist grantees are jointly and unanimously selected from a pool of nominees. The Family Residency is intended as a purely supportive and experiential experience, and does not impose required deliverables upon the selected artist.
Portrait of Nona Faustine. "Grace Roselli, Pandora's BoxX Project”.
ABOUT NONA FAUSTINE
Nona Faustine is a native New Yorker and award-winning photographer. Situated inside a photographic tradition while questioning the culture that bred that tradition, her practice walks the line between the past and the present, beginning where intersecting identities meet history. Through the family album and self-portraiture Faustine explores the inherited legacy of trauma, lineage, and history. Influenced by architecture and sculpture, she reconstructs a narrative of race, memory, and time that delves into stereotypes, folklore and anthropology. Her images are meditative reflections of a history Americans have not come to terms with, challenging the duality of what is both visible and invisible. They are not Photoshopped.
In 2019 she was distinguished with the New York Foundation Arts award in Photography, BRIC Colene Brown Art Prize, Anonymous Was A Woman Award, and Finalist in the National Portrait Gallery Outwin Boochever Competition. Her work focuses on history, identity, representation, evoking a critical and emotional understanding of the past and proposes a deeper examination of contemporary racial and gender stereotypes. Faustine’s images have been published in a variety of national and international media outlets such as Artforum, New York Times, Huffington Post, Hyperallergic, New Yorker Magazine, among others. Faustine's work has been exhibited at Harvard University, Rutgers University, Maryland State University, Studio Museum of Harlem, Brooklyn Museum, the International Center of Photography, Saint Johns Divine Cathedral, Tomie Ohtake Institute in Brazil and many others. Her work is in the collection of the David C. Driskell Center at Maryland State University, Studio Museum of Harlem, Brooklyn Museum and the Carnegie Museum, recently acquired in the Baltimore Museum, North Dakota Museum and the Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum in Minnesota.
ABOUT BAXTER ST
Baxter St at the Camera Club of New York supports emerging lens-based artists at critical moments of their careers. Founded in 1884, Baxter St is one of New York’s oldest artist-run nonprofit spaces, and has long been a catalyst for innovative creation within the artistic mediums of photography and video practices. Through exhibitions, workspace residency programs, and conversations series, Baxter St is a hub for a vibrant community deeply engaged in the art of lens-based contemporary practices.
ABOUT 7|G
7|G Foundation champions organizations and individuals that challenge inequality in human rights, education, art and culture. By partnering with organizations, artists and community facilitators we seek to build strong community bonds that elevate local culture, while supporting cultural change founded upon our core values of social impact and sustainability.