Marie-Solanges Apollon research residency

AWARE: Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions, with the support of artist Manuel Mathieu, is launching the second edition of the Marie-Solanges Apollon program.

This program seeks to encourage research that highlights the artistic practices of women in transcultural situations related to the Black Atlantic, according to Paul Gilroy, or to the Global South. For this edition, special attention will be given to propositions that focus on performance art by women artists from Africa and of African descent, from the 19th century to today. Projects that are part of a re-reading of art history through archival excavation, curatorial, academic, or community-based research will be particularly appreciated.

The program is named after Marie-Solanges Apollon, Manuel Mathieu’s grandmother, who was a Black immigrant woman living in Canada and a true potomitan. This polysemous creole term comes from the Haitian Vodou traditions and refers to a person, often a woman, who is the central pillar of their home, family, and community. The eponymous residency is an homage to her and to the women whose lives have historically been kept in the shadows.

In the context of this program, AWARE proposes a three-month residency at the Villa Vassilieff in Paris. During their time in Paris, the resident will be invited to host a meeting (conference/round table/masterclass) to present their work, and to publish a research article on the AWARE website.

About AWARE: Archives of Women Artists, Research & Exhibitions
AWARE: Archives of Women Artists, Research & Exhibitions is an independent non-profit organization founded in 2014 that works towards making women artists of the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries visible by producing and sharing free bilingual (French/English) content about their work on its website. This online resource presently contains 1,200 biographical texts and draws up to 110,000 visits per month.

AWARE represents a diversity of voices with texts written by around 500 researchers, curators, feminist art historians, art critics, and activists from all over the world. To widely disseminate research on women artists, AWARE also organizes symposia, round tables, and seminars in collaboration with institutions, universities, museums, and other independent structures internationally, and edits its own publications.

AWARE is located at the Villa Vassilieff in the Montparnasse neighborhood in Paris, where artist Marie Vassilieff set up her studio in the 1910s. Within this strongly symbolic space, AWARE has created a library and research center entirely devoted to women artists and feminist art, and hosts events, talks and school workshops.

Applications
To find out more and apply, please see the full call on the AWARE website.

Interviews with pre-selected candidates will take place in September 2024. The selection committee will be composed of:
–Françoise Vergès, author, feminist political scientist, artivist
–Marie-Ann Yemsi, curator and contemporary art consultant
–Two AWARE representatives