Introducing Remote Artist Residency (R.A.R.)
How can I make new work, receive a little financial support, and bring other artists along with me?
Artist residencies offer valuable opportunities for artists to focus on their practice, develop new work, and build connections. However, many residencies require participants to relocate or step away from work, family, or other responsibilities for an extended period. For some artists, these expectations create barriers to participation.
Remote Artist Residency (R.A.R.) is a small pilot project exploring a different model.
Over seven weeks, four Waimakariri artists are developing their individual practices while remaining embedded in their everyday lives. Rather than travelling away, participants are working from their own homes, studios, and communities. The residency provides flexibility, peer support, regular check-ins, and a modest stipend of $100 per week for each artist.
The project runs from May to June 2026 and will culminate in an exhibition at Oxford Gallery in early 2027.
At this stage, we are not working towards a shared theme. Instead, each artist is pursuing their own interests and questions, while coming together to discuss process, challenges, ideas, and the realities of maintaining a creative practice.
Alongside making artwork, I am interested in documenting the residency itself. What happens when a residency is designed around artists' existing lives rather than asking artists to reshape their lives around a residency? What role do time, community, flexibility, and financial support play in sustaining creative practice?
I will be sharing observations, reflections, and documentation as the project unfolds. My hope is that this project contributes, in a small way, to wider conversations about artist residencies, access to opportunities, and sustainable arts practice. As I am already discovering, documentation itself is a whole lot of work, so I am thinking of ways of sharing our findings meaningfully but lightly.
I am not an expert in any of these topics. I am just another artist trying to find my way through.
Mandy Palmer, Kate McIntyre and Tessa Warburton are on this journey with me.
This project is supported by Creative Communities.
