Thurber Park Artist-in-Residence
The Thurber Park Artist Residency was started by the City of Madison in 2019 in partnership with the Bubbler at Madison Public Library.
Goals
- Provide an artist with the funding, time, and space to develop their artistic practice.
- Engage residents surrounding Thurber Park and build deeper community connections through open studio sessions and hands-on programming.
- Encourage artists to research the public art industry, explore how their work can translate to the public realm, and potentially create and install a public art piece.
This project received a 2020 Historic Preservation Award for Adaptive Reuse from the Madison Trust for Historic Preservation.
Samantha Jane Mullen
Samantha Jane Mullen (b. 1991, State College, PA) is mostly a sculptor, sometimes a writer, occasionally a musician and always a curious creature who currently exists in Madison, WI. Samantha uses polymer clay, paper clay and various other mediums to create playful yet shocking narrative works which focus upon our connection to the land, society, childhood and, well, monsters. Her creations delve into the weird and the curious, the parts of ourselves we correct and mask and the perceived failures that act as building blocks for the walls we build between ourselves, our community and our planet. Each piece is a love letter to the panic attacked, the shame shadowed, the glittering, tired, playful, hopeful, damned but kind. Samantha Jane builds a mythology within her work around colorful and beastly incarnations of mental illness, celebrating and inviting the creatures within like wolves to the fire and giving them a little treat. From years of hawking her wares on the streets of New Orleans to being shown in galleries internationally, this self taught sculptor has accepted the unpredictable plot of living and intends to dance forward into the bizarre with an open heart and busy hands.
Craning my Neck to See the Why by Samantha Jane Mullen.
Cranes by Samantha Jane Mullen.
I Am the Turkey. I Am the Beast by Samantha Jane Mullen.
Samantha Jane Mullen with her artwork.
To Hunt a Beast that Never Was by Samantha Jane Mullens.
Jennifer Bastian: Fall 2024-2026
Jennifer Bastian is an autistic, queer and disabled artist and mother. Making art is what allows Bastian to regulate her nervous system. Her practice is related to the labor of parenting, grieving, and making community.
Bastian received her BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and her MA and MFA from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She was a finalist for the Women's Forward Fund Forward Art Prize in 2022, and was given an Award of Merit from WVA in the 2022 Wisconsin Biennial at MOWA. Bastian was the Thurber Park Artist in Residence 2024-2026.
Ash Armenta: Fall 2022-2024
Ash Armenta is an artist from California who works in printmaking and sculptural installations. They are a graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, earning their Masters of Arts in 2021 and MFA in 2022. Ash completed a two year program specializing in fine art lithography at Tamarind Institute and received the title of Tamarind Master Printer in 2017. They received their Bachelor of Art at The University of California Santa Cruz in 2011 with a concentration in Printmaking.
Ash utilizes most forms of traditional printmaking practices. They are currently interested in following a line of inquiry that asks how interpersonal relationships with self and community can be visualized? Ash addresses these questions through creating two and three dimensional printed work and sculptural installations that utilize sound and light.
Ash was the 2022-23 Thurber Artist in Residence, a year-long studio residency in partnership with the Madison Arts Commission. They workshop-assisted at Tandem Press 2019-2020. In 2017, Ash applied their lithographic skillet post Tamarind institute as a Research Fellow for the Frederick Hammersley Institute at the Getty Museum Archives. In 2018, Ash opened Little Giant Collective, a member-owned cooperative print studio in Santa Cruz, Ca. With a passion for sharing studio practice, Ash taught printmaking at Kala Institute in Berkeley 2017-2019.
Ash is passionate about teaching the beautiful practice of studio printmaking and has lectured at UW-Madison: Intro to Digital Art, Screenprint, and Relief Printmaking at UW-Madison. They have given artist talks at UC Santa Cruz, University of New Mexico, University of Kansas, and SGCI Printmaking conferences. Outside of art academia, they also enjoy teaching short form studio courses that range from printmaking to painting, drawing, and most recently kite making.
Ash is currently accepting inquiries for artwork acquisitions/ installations, guest lecturing, short form artist residencies, and guest-artist collaborations. Their current collaborator is the City of Madison in a permanent sculptural installation project .
Eric Adjetey Anang: Fall 2019-2022
Eric Adjetey Anang is a renowned Ghanaian sculptor and fantasy coffin carpenter, known for his imaginative creations. Born in Teshie, Ghana, he manages the Kane Kwei Carpentry Workshop. Alongside his work in Ghana, Eric splits his time with a dual residency in Madison, Wisconsin, where he engages in unique projects.
His career began in 2001 when he introduced Ghanaian design coffins at Gidan Makama Museum in Kano, Nigeria, through Alliance française. He took over the Kane Kwei Carpentry Workshop in 2005, continuing the legacy of Seth Kane Kwei. Eric Anang swiftly became a leading figure in contemporary Ghanaian art and gained international recognition for his exceptional coffin designs. In 2010, he participated in the photography project “Please, do not move!" with French photographer Guy Hersant. He was also invited to the Black World Festival in Dakar as a representative of Ghanaian designers. Eric's involvement in the United States has been significant. He facilitated an artist residency for Michael de Forest, a Senior Lecturer at the Oregon College of Art & Craft, in Ghana. At the 2019 Furniture Society Conference, both Adjetey Anang and Michael de Forest were speakers, presenting on research and craftsmanship. Eric also conducted demonstrations on coffin-making, showcasing the intricate process of crafting hollow, curved wooden sculptures.
Eric Anang has participated in numerous artist residencies and workshops worldwide. Notably, in 2014, he was a Resident Fellow at the Center for Art in Wood in Philadelphia, PA. He also held the position of Thurber Park Artist-in-Resident for 2019-2020, a collaboration between the Madison Arts Commission and the Bubbler at Madison Public Library in Madison, Wisconsin. In 2020, the University of Arkansas Little Rock Windgate Center for Art + Design hosted a solo exhibition titled “Celebrating Death: Fantasy Coffins of Ghana by Eric Adjetey Anang." This exhibition featured an array of his fantasy coffins, including unique designs like a giant hot pepper and a wing-tipped shoe.