Artist in Residence Program
Next Residency Dates: JAN-DEC 2025
Application Due: July 12
Westobou aims to inspire creativity in artistic expression and community advancement. This inspired us to create a year-long Artist in Residence program for artists and creatives in the Augusta area.
The Westobou Artist in Residence program awards free studio space to an emerging or mid-career Augusta-based visual artists for one year at the Gertrude Herbert Institute of Art (GHIA). The program provides a stipend for research, tools and supplies to build a body of work for an exhibition at Westobou Gallery. In collaboration with the GHIA, the artist in residence has the opportunity to teach a workshop series to community members.
Our 2024 Resident
Dylan Smeak
Dylan Smeak is an artist born and raised in Augusta, Georgia. His work explores the thick, sticky layers of cultural residue left by time and the haze of nostalgia evoked by objects as simple as worn stickers, old logos, and bygone technological devices. In his practice, Dylan relies heavily on the immediacy of airbrushing, combining the blue-collar, utilitarian techniques of set designers and automotive painters with the time-tested methods of classical painters.
Upcoming Exhibition: Inside Joke - February 2025 at Westobou Gallery
Our 2023 Resident
Brittany A. Fields
Fields grew up in Saint Louis, Missouri but her academic pursuits led her to Atlanta and New York respectively where she received her BA at Spelman College ’11 and MFA from the New York Academy of Art ‘13. Her work focuses on escapism, world and identity creation, and self-exploration while looking to spirituality, creation myths, fables & folk tales. Her preferred mediums are drawing and printmaking but experimentation with installation and materiality are important growing aspects of her work.
Exhibition: every thIng waS something else before. [sic] - February 2024 at Westobou Gallery
Our 2022 Resident
Devin Lovett
For the past four years Devin Lovett has been practicing art professionally in the city of Augusta, GA. Beginning with traditional sketches and line work he has evolved into acrylic, then to traditional oil painting. Devin has shown his work in multiple galleries across the Augusta area and Metro Atlanta, and has also had his work auctioned on multiple occasions. His style has evolved from expressionistic acrylic work to the more contemporary oil painting that he does today. Most of his work portrays stark forms combined with loose brushstrokes to create a chiseled effect that evokes a sense of macabre or melancholy. But you can also find more experimental work that are both thought provoking, and on occasion, unintentionally political.
https://pseudstudios.com/
Exhibition: Immaculate - February 2023 at Westobou Gallery
Our 2021 Resident
Joseph Kameen
Joseph Kameen’s narrative paintings investigate the desire to understand and examine our lives, even if we are ultimately unable to find answers. Primarily working in oils, his paintings are based on personal experiences and combine memory, invention, and reality. Kameen exhibits his work nationally and internationally, and shares his passion for art with the community and his students as an assistant professor of art at U of SC Aiken.
Exhibition: Alone Together - 2022 at Westobou Gallery