Artist in Residence Program
The Artist in Residence program at Olive's Porch is a grant-funded opportunity for early to mid-career artists to spend four months in Murphy and Brasstown, North Carolina focusing on their craft while connecting with our community.
Participants will live on the Folk School campus and have access to a studio at Olive’s Porch in downtown Murphy.
The residency will provide ample time for creative practice and opportunities to engage the community through demonstrations, conversations, and workshops.
Building on one of the original goals of our founders, Olive Dame Campbell and Marguerite Butler, this opportunity is focused on traditional Appalachian craft, music, and dance and aims to support the next generation of tradition bearers, keeping alive time-honored practices. We aim to foster a welcoming and exploratory space where artists can build relationships that will carry beyond their time in the studio.
The residency provides housing and meals, opportunities to take classes, and a $2,400 stipend. Artists will focus on honing their craft, with scheduled public engagement through demonstrations, workshops, or open studio time.
2023 Artists in Residence
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Carly Owens-Weiss; January- April 2023
Carly Owens Weiss is a multidisciplinary artist based in Boulder, Colorado. She received her BAD in Art + Design from North Carolina State University in 2017 and studied crewelwork and goldwork hand embroidery at the Royal School of Needlework in the United Kingdom.
In her current soft sculpture work, Carly uses hand embroidery to construct narratives using the displacement of everyday objects to explore identity through a personal and symbolic lens. She juxtaposes contrasting themes to create tensions that ultimately make the compositions both humorous and uncanny.
Carly’s work has been featured in numerous publications including Architectural Digest (Germany), Beautiful Bizarre Magazine, BUST Magazine and the American Scholar. Her recent exhibitions include group shows at the Museum of Arts and Design (New York, NY), the Bomb Factory Arts Foundation (London, UK), the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art (Boulder, CO) and the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts (Omaha, NE). Carly has also been awarded a Fellowship for a residency at Vermont Studio Center (Summer 2023). -
Jasmine Best; May- August 2023
Jasmine Best is a true Southern Artist, gathering narratives from her Carolinian family and childhood. The North Carolina based artist uses her personal memories and manipulations of her memories to create dialogues about the black female identity in the south and in predominantly white spaces.
She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from University of North Carolina at Greensboro and is currently pursuing a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Georgia. Jasmine was recently awarded the Artwork Archive Art Business Grant. She works with tangible and traditional mediums combined with digital means of art making. Her work often depicts maternal figures, each depicting the diversity and qualities that make up the black southern women in her life through several generations. -
Angela Eastman; September - December 2023
Angela Eastman is an artist and teacher residing in Hillsborough, North Carolina. She holds an MFA in Sculpture from Cranbrook Academy of Art and completed the Core Fellowship program at Penland School of Crafts, and has participated in residencies at MASS MoCA (MA), Vermont Studio Center (VT), the Woodstock Byrdcliffe Guild (NY), Sitka Center for Art and Ecology (OR), Talking Dolls (MI), the Ragdale Foundation (IL), and SIM and Nes residencies in Iceland.
In addition to sculptural work, Angela creates jewelry, baskets, furniture, and other home goods through her design business Flag Mountain Studio. Angela also teaches art workshops to adults and youth. She is an advocate for craft education as a vital component of understanding the material world we live in.
