NORTH ADAMS, Mass. – MCLA Arts and Culture, formerly MCLA Berkshire Cultural Resource Center, will host events and exhibitions by three guest artists in 2021 and 2022: Conrad Egyir, Nathaniel Donnett and Joshua Ross.
Upcoming Events
Ross will hold his opening lecture as Artist in Residence on October 5th at 5:30 p.m. in Murdock Hall Room 218 on the MCLA campus.
Egyir will give an opening lecture as the inaugural lecture of the Benedetti Teaching Artist in Residence on October 19th at 5:30 pm in Murdock Hall Room 218 on the MCLA Campus.
MCLA Artist Laboratory Residency
The MCLA Artist Laboratory Residency, now in its second year, will host Ross for the fall semester 2021 and Donnett for the spring semester 2022. Each of these artists was selected based on their practice, contribution to the art world, and the way in which their career reflects the diversity of thought, talent, and triumph that exists among artists striving towards what is considered to be will contribute and consequently expand it canon of art history.
Joshua Ross holds an MFA in Art from the University of California, Irvine, and a BFA in Photography from the Herron School of Art, Indianapolis. Ross’ research-based practice is an entrenched phenomenological approach that examines institutional, physical, and spatial structures that organize and influence perception. Ross’ multidisciplinary practice uses and appropriates a wide variety of materials and media developed through relationships with methods inherent in his research and archival experiences in photography. Some of the recent notable exhibitions Ross has shown include the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Queens LA, and Human Resources Los Angeles.
Nathaniel Donnett lives and works in Houston, Texas. Donnett received his BA in Fine Arts from Texas Southern University and his MFA from Yale University School of Art. Donnett is a recipient of a 2020 Dean’s Critical Practice Research Grant, 2020 Art and Social Justice Initiative Grant, and the 2020-2021 Helen Frankenthaler Fellowship . Donnett is the founder of the “Not That But This” website blog. Donnett was awarded a Houston Arts Alliance Individual Artist Grant, a 2014 Harpo Foundation Grant, 2015/2011 Idea Fund / Andy Warhol Foundation Grant, and a 2010 Artadia Award in 2017/2011. His work has been shown at the Virginia Museum of Fine Art, Richmond, VA, the Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art, Virginia Beach, Virginia, the Mennello Museum, Orlando Fla, the American Museum, Washington, DC, and many other museums across America
Benedetti Artist and Teaching Residency
New this year, the MCLA Arts and Culture Benedetti Artist and Teaching Residency welcomes a teaching artist to campus to spend the school year creating work, teaching, and with the students, staff and faculty as well as the North Adams community and beyond that to get in touch. The first Benedetti Artist and Teaching Resident is Conrad Egyir.
Conrad Egyir’s work borrows from Afrocentric folklore rooted in political and religious scholarship. He creates narrative paintings that focus on themes from the Afro-Diaspora that interact with identical versions of themselves. At the same time, they take on several staged roles, both as antagonist and protagonist, as friend and enemy, or as nobleman and commoner as a tool that immerses the viewer in awe of a collective human spirit in the diverse incarnations of each topic. Conrad Egyir has exhibited at the Jessica Silverman Gallery, San Francisco; Library Street Collective, Detroit; and Mindy Solomon Gallery, Miami, among others.
The Benedetti Teaching Artist Residency seeks dynamic exhibiting artists with an understanding of technical and conceptual issues in the media of painting, sculpture, graphic design, illustration or mixed media, with knowledge of historical and contemporary practices and a commitment to artistic imagination and education. The resident is selected based on excellence in professional achievement, creative achievement and recognition in their specific field and provides certain services to the college including lectures, performances, demonstrations, master classes and counseling.
This residence is financed by a legacy from the estate of Alma Benedetti in ’37. As an art teacher in North Adams and a lifelong advocate and friend of the college, Alma Benedetti has inspired generations of children with her keen sense of color, composition, and design.
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