Call for applications: University of Johannesburg Artists in Residency programme

The programme is designed to stimulate arts practice as research and aims to support the development and presentation of new creative output.

Eligibility 

• The programme is open for applications from new, emerging and established artists from across the globe, but preferably with a connection to Africa.
• Artists are eligible to apply for physical and/or remote residencies at the institution. Thus, depending on the nature of the proposed residency, successful artists may work partly or completely remotely.
• Applicants may not be affiliated with another South African tertiary institution.
• Applications must be accompanied by a letter of endorsement by a UJ host department or division.
• Only proposals for projects that fall within the following disciplines will be eligible:
  • Music.
  • Visual arts and fine arts.
  • Theatre.
  • Performance and dance.
  • Design.
  • Film and television.
  • Literary arts.
• Artists in Residence positions are awarded on a competitive basis, taking the applicant’s career track record, level of productivity, academic writing experience or potential and residency proposal into account.

Programme objectives

The primary objective of the Artists in Residence Programme is the preparation of no less than one creative outputs submission within a 12-month period that complies with the Department of Higher Education’s criteria for creative outputs:

Additionally, artists-in-residence will be required to:

• Timeously complete and sign temporary appointment forms and supply supporting documentation.
• Attend a select number of creative output capacity development workshops and/or presentations as directed by the Creative Outputs Task Team.
• Prepare a creative output submission for the Department of Higher Education within the 12-month residency as noted above. UJ reserves the right to request additional revisions, amendments and/or additions to creative output submissions when it is processed by UJ for submission to the Department of Higher Education, which may fall outside the residency (fixed-term temporary employment) period.
• Artists in Residence together with their host department or division will be responsible for the management and administration of their projects and will be required to submit a 300-word status update to the Artists in Residence Programme every month at the end of the month.
• Present workshops and/or lectures and/or participate in activities presented by the artist’s host department or division.

UJ application process

• Step 1: Upon receipt of the letter of endorsement sent to air@uj.ac.za, the applicant will receive a link to complete an online form application.
• Step 2: Applicants are required to acquire a letter of endorsement from a UJ department or division that will be the custodian of the project. Letters of endorsement should reflect on the role the department or division will play in the collaboration as well as the kind of enabling environment it is able to provide. Letters should include any administrative, physical and/or financial resources that the department or division will contribute to the collaborative Artists in Residence project(s). If additional project funding is required, a resourcing/fundraising strategy should be included in the project proposal.

The application deadline is 31 July.

Letter of endorsement

• Music: UJ does not have a dedicated music department and research in this field may be considered through the UJ Choir and/or UJ Arts & Culture.
• Visual arts and fine arts: There are several departments and divisions that are able to host these kinds of residencies including but not limited to Research Centre, Visual Identities in Art and Design (VIAD), South African Research Chair in South African Art and Visual Culture, Department of Visual Art, FADA Gallery, and UJ Art Gallery.
• Theatre, performance and dance: Research in this area should be endorsed by UJ Arts & Culture or Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Study (JIAS).
• Design: There are several design departments in the Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture including Architecture, Graduate School of Architecture, Fashion Design, Graphic Design, Interior Design, Jewellery Design and Manufacture, and Design Studies.
• Film and Television Department of Communication in the Humanities as well as Multimedia in the Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture (FADA) are options.
• Literary arts: Languages, Cultural Studies and Applied Linguistics, African Languages, Anthropology and Development Studies, English, History, Department of Philosophy, Sociology, Psychology, and Strategic Communications in the Humanities faculty and/or the Faculty of Education.

Note: The lists above is not exhaustive and applicants may apply for residencies in collaboration with any UJ department or division that wishes to participate in creative practice as research.

Finance

Successful applicants will be offered a 12-month residency formalised through temporary employment at the institution. A monthly stipend of R10 000 (subject to statutory deductions) will be made available to artists-in-residence. The programme is designed as a stimulus programme and no additional project/seed funding will be made available through the programme.

Potential UJ host departments or divisions and artists interested in the programme are invited to attend a virtual session where questions they may have will be answered. The session will take place on 15 July at 2pm.

Interested participants should RSVP here.

All questions regarding this call should be emailed to Jermain Johnson at air@uj.ac.za.

View the original call here.