This post was originally published for the arts and culture blog Beyond James (May 30, 2023)
For the past few months, I’ve made a weekly pilgrimage. Okay, maybe it’s not much of a pilgrimage. It’s more of a destination. Every Tuesday morning, after dropping my kids off at school, I take the short trip from my neighbourhood to Theatre Aquarius. Thanks to the generosity of Artistic Director Mary Francis Moore, I’ve been able to sit somewhere in the theatre and work on the drafting of a new play.
Although my writing excursions to Aquarius haven’t been part of a formalized residency program, the Theatre has been generous enough to offer their lobby and lounge space to me as a local playwright. I chose to take advantage of this offer in a structured way to keep me honest and focused. And, thanks to some grant money from Kitchener-based Green Light Arts for the new play I was working on, I was able to go into these one-day-a-week residencies with some financial support. The experience of writing in a different location always holds a special charge for artists of any kind, I think. It’s an experience that every artist should fit into their career for, regardless of the drawbacks, creating art in another location pays huge dividends
The change in location, or dislocation, of creating art outside of your studio or home office can serve to offset your normal artistic sensibilities. This is true whether or you’re writing in a far off location or as part of a more immediate, informal residency in your hometown. The feeling like you’re going somewhere new automatically imparts a sense of a journey for any artist regardless of their discipline. Over the years, I’ve increasingly been convinced that this is a critical if under appreciated aspect of a successful arts career. Of course, artists who take up a residency are oftentimes under pressure—whether self-imposed or by the residency hosts themselves—to produce some sort of finished piece as a result of their dislocation. But this might miss the point of a residency to begin with.
Oftentimes, artists create their best and most vibrant work from a place of discomfort. And being forced by a residency outside of your familiar surroundings has the effect of pushing one’s creative sensibilities out of the tried and true. Sure, you may have your laptop or smartphone to connect with Twitter and Youtube, but you’re in a different space often surrounded by different people. And it’s this factor—the potential to meet with other people in the residency—that can offer up new insights and opportunities, ones that simply wouldn’t materialize if the artists were creating in their home office or studio.
I know of several visual artists who share studio space; essentially, they offer the benefits of both a personal space AND a residency in their creative practice. One of the best examples of this in Hamilton–and one I’m personally familiar with–is the Cotton Factory. The former industrial building turned cultural hub and gallery space hosts studio space for dozens of visual artists and creative professionals. In many cases, these studios are large, warehouse-sized rooms where artists practicing wildly different mediums work side by side. And it’s not just visual artists, either. Dancers, musicians and even writers (myself included) in residence make use of this shared space. The result, perhaps, is collaborative creation that still retains an artist’s individuality that comes from working on one’s own. All of it, of course, is what pushes an artist towards growth.
Much is often made of residencies being free of every day distractions. And this is true to a certain extent. Unlike my home office, there’s no laundry machine in the basement, dishes piled in the sink or dog barking for a walk to distract you from the work. But, as I mentioned, there’s the Internet on every laptop and device so artists prone to distractions can always find something to do other than the work at hand. And residencies, regardless of where they’re located, can confront some with real challenges in terms of personal adjustment. Some artists just can’t get down to work in unfamiliar surroundings or can feel isolated and unsafe. Indeed, some of the best residency experiences I’ve had didn’t work for others precisely because they were cut off from a familiar, urban environment or featured a communal living situation with unfamiliar people.
Nonetheless, I think the real magic of residency dislocation has to do with the artist’s interaction with the location itself. Every location has character and stories all their own, whether they’re close at hand or further afield. And artists that choose to engage with these stories, and any community or culture that goes with it, will enrich the experience of their residency. As well, because many residencies are self-directed, the onus is on the artists themselves to find collaborative opportunities with others on site. Such opportunities aren’t hard to find, either. They can come out of a simple conversation between two creators passing one another in the hall or eating lunch in a common area.
Many residencies, be they structured or self-directed, offer limited financial support or compensation for artists. And this can present a barrier for creators, no question. However, I’m a big fan of location dislocation as a way to jumpstart your creative process. And, after three years of lockdowns and social distancing, I really can’t think of anything better than a creative outlet somewhere removed from my house… if only for a few hours of inspiration.
Near and Now 