News
samstag media release
AUSTRALIA COUNCIL AND SAMSTAG PROGRAM IN GROUNDBREAKING CULTURAL PARTNERSHIP
14 December 2009
The University of South Australia's Samstag Program has
become a key partner of the Australia Council for the Arts' Visual Arts Board,
in an innovative cultural collaboration announced today. The experimental
funding partnership brings together Australia's national arts
funding agency with the University's prestigious Samstag Program.
Chair of the Visual Arts Board, Professor Ted Snell,
reports that from 2010 the Board's two annual studio residencies at the
International Studio and Curatorial Program, New York (ISCP), will be offered to
Australian artists in a collaborative partnership with the Samstag Program.
To be known as the Australia Council for the
Arts and Anne & Gordon Samstag ISCP Residencies, the partnership
is expected to provide a number of benefits to Australian artists, not least in
the stipend paid to artists awarded the residency, which will increase to
$25,000 per six-month residency.
UniSA Vice Chancellor and President, Professor Peter Høj,
has strongly supported the new partnership.
"It creates a wonderful synergy between our nation's peak
cultural organisation, the Australia Council, and the renowned scholarships
program created by American artist Gordon Samstag, whose famous bequest through
the University of South Australia ranks as the greatest philanthropic gift made
expressly for the development and education of Australian visual artists,"
Professor Høj said.
"Gordon Samstag – himself a born-and-bred New Yorker – was
known to revere New York as a preferred destination for his Samstag Scholars,
and so the ISCP New York studio residencies offer a remarkably good fit for the
University's Samstag Program, in fulfilling Mr Samstag's generous vision."
Recipients of Australia Council for the Arts
and Anne & Gordon Samstag ISCP Residencies will also have formal
status as 'Samstag Scholars', a distinction widely prized by the Samstag alumni
for its valuable professional cachet.
"This important funding partnership will create new
opportunities for Australian artists, and of course allow the Visual Arts Board,
working with the Samstag Program, to invest more funds in our vital overseas
studio program," said Professor Snell. "Residencies like
these are important stepping stones in the goal of the Australia Council to help
artists build well developed and sustainable careers."
Australia Council for the Arts and Anne &
Gordon Samstag ISCP Residencies are open to practicing visual
artists, craftspeople, designers and media artists. The ISCP Residency grants
will be administered through the Visual Arts Board.
Further information on the residencies and application
details will be available from January 2010 on both the Australia Council and
Samstag Program websites.
For media information or comment, contact:
Erica Green, Director Samstag Museum of Art, 08 8302 0870
Image: Dr Anna Ciccarelli, Pro Vice Chancellor and Vice President: International and Development and Professor Peter Høj, Vice Chancellor and President, University of South Australia; and Professor Ted Snell, Chair of the Visual Arts Board, Australia Council. Photo: Sam Noonan