Brother Thomas Fund and Fellows Program
The Brother Thomas Fund was established at the Boston Foundation in 2007 to honor the legacy of Brother Thomas Bezanson, a Benedictine monk and world-renowned ceramic artist, who wanted the sale of his work to help other artists, as his friends had helped him.
Toward the end of his life, Brother Thomas joined forces with Sue and Bernie Pucker, owners of the Pucker Gallery on Boston’s Newbury Street, to continue his legacy.
The goal of the biennial Brother Thomas Fellowship program is to support and celebrate a diverse group of Greater Boston artists working at a high level of excellence in a range of disciplines—the visual, performing, literary, media and craft arts—and to enhance their ability to thrive and create new work. The Boston Foundation also hopes that fellowship winners will have greater access to a variety of markets, including galleries, residencies and commissions, and that the importance of artists to the vitality of Boston will be more broadly recognized.
Each Brother Thomas Fellow receives an unrestricted award of $15,000—thus fulfilling the needs of artists and the wishes of the donor.
Award Process
Brother Thomas Fellows are selected in alternate years based on an inclusive, two-step process of nomination and panel review. A diverse group of nominators from Boston’s large pool of nonprofit arts leaders, academics, gallerists, collectors and for-profit arts presenters select the initial pool of artists. The nominators focus on mid-career artists to assure that the fellowships are awarded to individuals who have made a firm commitment to their art and are working at a high level of achievement. Nominators also give extra consideration to artists who are at a catalytic moment in their life and career when a fellowship could have a transformative impact. The Fellowship program acknowledges that even established artists may struggle for the resources they need to advance their art.
The nominated artists submit work samples, a resumé and an artist statement for consideration by a multi-disciplinary panel convened at the Boston Foundation.
All panelists complete a conflict of interest disclosure form to ensure a fair and equitable process. Should a conflict of interest arise, these individuals do not participate in this portion of the panel process.
Support the Brother Thomas Fellowship
The Boston Foundation believes raising their visibility will also increase their access to galleries, residencies and commissions, and demonstrate the importance of artists to the vitality of Boston. Since 2009, $1,365,000 in funding has been awarded to 91 Fellows. The quality and the range of their work are astounding, and are matched by their intense dedication to their work. As former Brother Thomas Fellows welcome new award winners, a larger “fellowship” of encouragement and support has emerged in the community of artists.
If you are interested in helping us grow the Brother Thomas Fellowship program, you may contribute directly to the fund. If you are a donor or a collector who would like to learn more about Brother Thomas’s works of art as a way of supporting the fund, please contact us at 617-338-1700.
More about Brother Thomas
The ceramic work of Brother Thomas Bezanson is displayed in more than 80 museums around the world, including New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Vatican. The largest and most diverse collection is in the Pucker Gallery on Newbury Street in Boston. Owners Sue and Bernie Pucker had represented Brother Thomas’ work over the decades and became his close friends. Toward the end of his life, they joined forces to create a legacy to benefit other artists: Today, proceeds of the sale of his works held by the Pucker Gallery go to the Brother Thomas Fellowships.
Brother Thomas knew that for most artists, the journey is a challenging one, and that even established artists may struggle for the resources they need to advance their art. The biennial Brother Thomas Fellowship program supports and celebrates a diverse group of Greater Boston artists working at a high level of excellence in the visual, performing, literary, media and craft arts—bolstering their ability to thrive and create new work.
Meet the 2023 Fellows
Sabrina Avilés
Filmmaker and Founder & Executive Director of CineFest Latino Boston
Victoria Lynn Awkward
Director of VLA DANCE
Daniel Callahan
Multidisciplinary Artist
Cicely Carew
Artist
Catarina Coelho
Artist
Monica Cohen
Documentarian, Video Producer
Joëlle Fontaine
Multimedia Artist
Paul Goodnight
Painter
Tim Hall
Artist, Educator, Connector
Elisa H. Hamilton
Multimedia Artist
Lucy Kim
Visual Artist
Ashton Lites
Founder, President, StiggityStackz Worldwide Inc.
Silvia Lopez Chavez
Artist
U-Meleni Mhlaba-Adebo
Interdisciplinary Artist, Author, Educator
Cassandra Queen
Artist
Kathryn Ramey
Filmmaker
Ellen Schön
Ceramic Artist
Anjali Srinivasan
Artist, Associate Professor at MassArt
Zahili Zamora
Pianist, Composer, Arranger, Educator
Josephine Burr
Ceramics
L’Merchie Frazier
Fabrics & Textiles
Dey Hernández
Interdisciplinary Performance
Kaovanny Holguin
Music Performance
Jonathan Bailey Holland
Music Composition
Tatiana Johnson-Boria
Literary Arts: Poetry
Fred Liang
Mixed Media/Ceramics
Fabiola M. Mendez
Music Performance
Patricia Zarate Perez
Music Performance
Moe Pope
Music Performance
Allison Maria Rodriguez
Video Installation
Grace Talusan
Literary Arts: Writing
Chanel Thervil
Mixed Media
Susan Thompson
Fabric & Textiles
Cynthia Yee
Literary Arts: Writing
Karen Young
Cultural Organizing
Jorge Santiago Arce
Performing Artist
Anjimile Chithambo
Musician
Shaumba-Yandje Dibinga
Dancer/Performer
Robert Gibbs
Muralist
Ashe Gordon
Musician (Violist)
Arthur Halvorsen
Ceramicist
Yara Liceaga-Rojas
Poet/Performer
Porsha Olayiwola
Poet
Oompa
Musician
Valerie Stephens
Performing Artist/Storyteller
Billy Dean Thomas
Musician
Kyla Toomey
Ceramicist
Jean Appolon
Choreographer/Dance Educator
Sandeep Das
Musician
Maya Erdelyi
Animator/Director
Maria Finkelmeier
Percussionist/Composer
Patrick Gabridge
Playwright/Author
Regie Gibson
Performer/Poet
Stephen Hamilton
Visual Artist/Educator
Kathryn King
Ceramic Artist/Teacher
Shaw Pong Liu
Violinist/Composer
Marsha Parrilla
Choreographer
Hakim Raquib
Photographer
Evelyn Rydz
Visual Artist
Enzo Silon Surin
Poet
Yu-Wen Wu
Interdisciplinary Artist
Nicole Aquillano
Ceramic Artist
Halsey Burgund
Sound Artist and Musician
Danielle Legros Georges
Poet
Raúl Gonzalez III
Visual Artist
Napoleon Jones-Henderson
Visual Artist
Masako Kamiya
Visual Artist
Balla Kouyaté
Composer/Musician
Sandrine Schaefer
Performance Artist
Michelle Seaton
Author
Jae Williams
Filmmaker
Ambreen Butt
Multimedia Artist
Lorraine Chapman
Choreographer
Sean Fielder
Choreographer
Ekua Holmes
Visual Artist
Matti Kovler
Composer
Megumi Naitoh
Ceramic Artist
Sachiko Akiyama
Sculptor
Angela Cunningham
Ceramic Artist
David Valdes Greenwood
Playwright/Author
Wendy Jehlen
Dancer
Chandra Dieppa Ortiz
Painter/Sculptor
Robert Todd
Documentary Filmmaker
John Oluwole ADEkoje
Filmmaker/Playwright
Kati Agócs
Composer
Barbara Helfgott
Poet
Richard Hoffman
Poet
Brian Knep
Video Artist
Alla Kovgan
Dance-based Filmmaker
Tracy Heather Strain
Documentary Filmmaker
Heather White
Jeweler/Designer
Meet the 2023 Brother Thomas Fellows
Sabrina Avilés
Filmmaker and Founder & Executive Director of CineFest Latino Boston
cinefestlatino.com
Sabrina Avilés is an award-winning independent filmmaker and educator, as well as the Founder and Executive Director of CineFest Latino Boston. Born in New York City to Puerto Rican Dominican immigrants, she sees her life reflected in the stories she documents about Latinx communities. Avilés is a graduate of the Boston University film program. As a documentarian, her goal is to tell in-depth stories, incorporating longer substantive conversations with the community over time, moving beyond the headlines. By drawing attention to issues of Latinx communities, she hopes her films will shift perspectives and foster a deeper understanding of the human experience. Currently, she is working on a feature film about Chelsea, Mass., exploring the challenges and resilience of the city.
Victoria Lynn Awkward
Director of VLA DANCE
vladance.com
Victoria Lynn Awkward is a multi-hyphenate creator, administrator, and educator, aiming to inspire people through her work to pause and reflect on their actions toward themselves, their community, and their environment. Along with directing VLA Dance, Awkward is a freelance artist, recently choreographing The Boy Who Kissed the Sky, Bluebeard’s Castle, and Romeo and Juliet. A graduate of Goucher College, receiving high honors in dance, visual art, and education, she has taught at Salem State University, West End House, Middlesex School and elsewhere, and continues deepening her teaching practices with the Midday Movement Series. She utilizes her creative practices to claim joy and love of her existence as a Queer Black woman and inspires others to thoughtfully own their respective identities.
Daniel Callahan
Multidisciplinary Artist
danielcallahan.com
Daniel Callahan, multidisciplinary artist and designer, merges media such as film, painting, photography, and performance, seeking to create immersive experiences incorporating story, ritual, and the human form to explore aspects of resilience and mysticism. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Design, with a master of fine arts in film and video degree from Emerson College, Callahan and his work have been featured at Boston’s Museum of Fine Art, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the Institute of Contemporary Art, the Queens Museum, the New Orleans Museum of Art, and in publications such as The Believer magazine, Words Beats & Life: the Global Journal of Hip-Hop Culture, and the Smithsonian Press.
Cicely Carew
Artist
cicelycarew.com
Cicely Carew’s printmaking and sculptural works channel radical joy and liberation. Carew has collaborated on exhibitions and installations with Now + There, the Fitchburg Art Museum, Northeastern University, and others. Carew won the 2023 Boston ICA’s James and Audrey Foster Prize. She holds degrees from Mass College of Art and Design and Lesley University. Carew is also a wellness facilitator and educator, and lives in Cambridge, Mass., with her son.
Catarina Coelho
Artist
catarinalcoelho.com
Born in Portugal, Catarina Coelho explores the expanded field of print, often incorporating painting and writing. Her work appears in national and international exhibitions and is held in several collections, including the Boston Public Library and the Museum of Fine Arts Boston. After studying at the University of Lisbon and the Accademia di Belle-Arti di Brera in Milan, she received her master’s degree from Mass College of Art and Design.
Monica Cohen
Documentarian, Video Producer
theboomhouse
productions.com
Monica Cohen is a Colombian filmmaker whose documentaries center on art and culture in social transformation and human connection. Cohen founded Boom House Productions, a Boston-based company, specializing in the production of promotional videos rooted in cinematic and documentary style storytelling. She has been a part of award- winning film projects that have been shown around the world and in festivals such as Sundance, CPH:DOX, and FICCI, among others. Cohen believes in the power of stories to build bridges and spark important conversations that could be the catalyst to a more equitable world.
Joëlle Fontaine
Multimedia Artist
iamkreyol.com
Joëlle Fontaine is a Haïtian-American fashion designer, aesthetics and vibe architect, creative director, and entrepreneur utilizing fashion and art to advance social awareness and change. Fontaine accomplishes this through numerous artistic mediums and her entrepre- neurial endeavors. She founded Kréyol, a high-fashion lifestyle brand providing a platform for economic mobility and sustainability to artisans and creatives worldwide. Fontaine firmly believes that art and entrepreneurship can create an economic revolution.
Paul Goodnight
Painter
paulgoodnight.com
Raised in Roxbury, Mass., and New London, Conn., Paul Goodnight returned to Boston after serving in the Vietnam War to pursue a career as an artist. His work has appeared in the films Ghost, The Preacher’s Wife, and Gone Baby Gone, among others, and on many television programs including Seinfeld and The Fresh Prince of Bel Air. He has been featured in Architectural Digest, Décor Magazine, Ebony, Essence, Miami Design, People, and Upscale, as well as 100 Boston Painters. Here at home, the Baystate Banner and Boston Globe consider him one of our most talented native sons. He received his B.F.A. and an honorary M.F.A. from the Massachusetts College of Art. Goodnight’s learning continued under Paul Rahilly, John Biggers, and Chuck Stigliano.
Tim Hall
Artist, Educator, Connector
timvhall.com
Tim Hall is an award-winning musician, performance poet, and producer from Detroit, Mich., with Boston as his current home. Hall’s poetry charts nuances of Blackness, masculinity, and the beauties of life. He is a faculty member at Berklee College of Music; a trustee with the Harvard American Repertory Theater; a member of the award-winning band STL GLD; and co- owner of HipStory, a digital media production company. Hall has shared stages and recorded with The Nappy Roots, Carolyn Malachi, Bilal, Chris Turner, Aloe Blacc, Maria Finkelmeier, The Boston Symphony Orchestra, and Diana Oh, among others. The 2020 Boston Music Awards named him Session Musician of the Year, and WBUR included him in the 2019 ARTery 25 (Millennials of color impacting Boston arts and culture).
Elisa H. Hamilton
Multimedia Artist
elisahhamilton.com
Elisa H. Hamilton is a socially engaged multimedia artist creating artwork and community-centered programs emphasizing shared spaces and the hopeful examination of our everyday places, objects, and experiences. Her work has been shown locally and nationally in solo and group exhibitions, and she has created participatory projects for institutions including the Institute of Contemporary Art, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and the Currier Museum of Art. Holding a bachelor of fine arts in painting from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design, and a master of art in civic media: art and practice from Emerson College, Hamilton strives to make artwork that brings people together, activates conversation about social issues, and fosters greater understanding of ourselves and one another.
Lucy Kim
Visual Artist
lucykim.com
Lucy Kim is a visual artist exploring the many naturalizing mechanisms that structure day-to-day visual experiences. Her practice is wide-ranging aesthetically and materially, with her focus on developing forms that are visceral, tactile, and less vision-centric. Using a broad range of materials such as oil paint, silicone rubbers, resins, and live bacteria cells producing melanin, her work acts to understand and challenge the power of appearance, and the socio-cultural systems working to produce visibility. Recent exhibitions of her work were held at Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art, Institute of Fine Arts at New York University, and Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, among others. Kim is an Associate Professor of Art at Boston University.
Ashton Lites
Founder, President, StiggityStackz Worldwide Inc.
stiggity.com
Ashton “Stiggity Stackz” Lites is one of Boston’s most renowned and veteran freestyle dance specialists, with 15+ years of intensive training in cultural and concert dance forms, including Krump, Popping, Locking, House, Hip Hop, Ballet, Tap, Jazz, Modern, Afro-Haitian, and beyond. Experienced event organizer, instructor, and choreographer, and well-traveled in the underground Hip Hop competition circuit, he runs community-based dance and creative entrepreneurship development programs, events, and festivals. With StiggityStackz Worldwide, he has partnered with DS4SI, The Boston Ballet, Red Bull, The Museum of Science, The Mass Hip Hop Archive, and others. Stackz is dedicated to supporting and centering his community in achieving artistic excellence, economic sustainability, and historical recognition, with specific care and attention to Black creatives across generations and creative outlets.
Silvia Lopez Chavez
Artist
silvialopezchavez.com
Silvia Lopez Chavez is a Dominican-American visual artist whose collaborative murals forge meaningful cross-cultural connections and transform urban spaces by exploring personal stories of adaptation and resilience via painting, printmaking, and drawing. She was named a Neighborhood Salon Luminary by the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and received the New England Women’s Leadership Award by the Boys and Girls Club of America and the New England Foundation of the Arts’ Leadership in Public Art Award. She completed artist residencies at MASS MoCA, Haystack, and Vermont Studio Center. Commissions include the U.S. Chinese Embassy in Beijing, Google HQ in California, Peabody Essex Museum, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Harvard and Northeastern universities. Lopez Chavez is a graduate of the Massachusetts College of Art and Design.
U-Meleni Mhlaba-Adebo
Interdisciplinary Artist,
Author, Educator
u-meleni.com
U-Meleni Mhlaba-Adebo, a Boston-based Zimbabwean- American artist, author, and educator, examines and highlights fluid identities and intricate emotions using sonic elements, English, Shona songs, and storytelling, amplifying human experiences. Rooted in Zimbabwean-American heritage and merging Ndau and Ndebele lineages, she reshapes notions of womanhood, resilience, love, beauty, liberty, motherhood, and kinship as an “Emotional Anthropologist.” Drawing from medicine woman heritage, Mhlaba-Adebo invites exploration of ancestral connection through her work intertwining memory, personal and historical narratives, and global fabric. Her creative process is shaped with tools such as pen, typewriter, laptop, videography, voice, Mbira, and body.
Cassandra Queen
Artist
quueenn.com
Cassandra Queen is a multidisciplinary artist, independent scholar, and creative entrepreneur from Boston, Mass. Her creative practice is rooted in exploring and understanding Black fiber traditions, textile arts, crafts, and histories. Recently, her background and experience led to the creation of works at the intersection of design, function, craft, and technology, employing natural dyeing of fabric and fibers, textile design, millinery, digital fabrication, and fashion design. She has received awards and distinguished fellowships for her artistic practice and creative entrepreneurship along with recognition for her work as a costume designer for a regional theater in the Boston area. Queen is the founder of QUUEENN, a design studio and brand centering storytelling through craft.
Kathryn Ramey
Filmmaker
rameyfilms.com
Guggenheim Fellow and Creative Capital Award winner Kathryn Ramey is a filmmaker and anthropologist, working at the experimental edges of both disciplines with films, installations, and performances exhibited widely. From domestic and global concerns to the personal and political, her work is characterized by manipulation of the celluloid, “troubling” the image and agitating the viewer. Ramey leads workshops and publishes articles and books on alternative film techniques, working to manifest radical empathy through a love of creating and sharing gritty, artisanal, experimental film form. In the Anthropocene, with human activity the central driver of climate change and its existential threat, small-gauge ecologically oriented artists like Ramey embody a sustainable future for the medium.
Ellen Schön
Ceramic Artist
ellenschon.com
Ellen Schön is a ceramic artist embracing both ancient and contemporary techniques in two distinct yet complementary series. Her traditional hand-coiled organic forms evoke the gesture and stance of the human figure, and pose narrative vignettes recalling connections and disconnections, meetings and partings. Harnessing new technology in her 3D clay-printed geometrical structures alluding to the mathematical symmetry of Platonic solids, she brings her tactile sense of clay into the digital sphere. Throughout all of the work, Schön’s original intention persists—to create unique, personal forms which resonate, whether functional, metaphorical, or somewhere in between. Schön is Adjunct Professor in Fine Arts and Ceramics Studio Supervisor at Lesley University College of Art and Design in Cambridge, Mass.
Anjali Srinivasan
Artist, Associate Professor at MassArt
anjalisrinivasan.com
Anjali Srinivasan began her creative practice with collaborative research and design initiatives aimed at socioeconomic empowerment with traditional artisans in India in 1998. In the studio, she develops ways to discover, access, and restructure information held in a material or situation, and is currently exploring “biological craftpersonship” and “crowd-created” entities in the fields of sustainability and social engagement. She completed undergraduate studies at the National Institute of Fashion Technology in New Delhi and Alfred University in New York, and a graduate degree from the Rhode Island School of Design. Srinivasan lives and works between India and the United States, as Associate Professor at Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Boston, and Director at ChoChoMa Studios, Bengaluru.
Zahili Zamora
Pianist, Composer, Arranger, Educator
zahilizamora.com
Zahili Zamora’s professional musical career has taken her from Cuba, Canada, and Southeast Asia to the United States, with her rich musical background and career experience rendering her a leader in the modern Afro-Latin jazz idiom. With her former trio, MIXCLA, Zamora headlined at the 59th Monterey Jazz Festival, the 2016 Stave Sessions with Celebrity Series of Boston, and the 2015 Montreal International Jazz Festival. After joining the Berklee College of Music Piano Department in 2019, Zamora received her master of music in contemp- orary performance degree with a concentration in music performance anxiety in August 2023. Currently, she is working on her third album, featuring music inspired by her ongoing research on music performance anxiety.
Past Fellows
Since 2009, more than 90 talented artists have been recognized with the Brother Thomas Fellowship.
The artists who have received fellowships to date are extraordinary. Past fellows have won numerous awards and prizes during and after their fellowships, and been recognized among the leading artists in their disciplines nationally and internationally. They, along with all future Fellows, will make tremendous contributions to the art world over the course of their lives and will enrich our community in ways we can only imagine.
2021 Brother Thomas Fellows
Photos by Craig Bailey unless otherwise noted
To view the 2021 Fellows with their full biographies, click here.
Josephine Burr
Ceramics
L'Merchie Frazier
Fabrics/Textiles
Dey Hernández
Interdisciplinary Performance
Kaovanny Holguin
Music Performance
Jonathan Bailey Holland
Music Composition
Tatiana Johnson-Boria
Literary Arts: Poetry
Fred Liang
Mixed Media/Ceramics
Fabiola M. Mendez
Music Performance
Patricia Zarate Perez
Music Performance
Moe Pope
Music Performance
Allison Maria Rodriguez
Video Installation
Grace Talusan
Literary Arts: Writing
Chanel Thervil
Mixed Media
Susan Thompson
Fabric and Textiles
Cynthia Yee
Literary Arts: Writing
Karen Young
Cultural Organizing
2019 Brother Thomas Fellows
For full biographies of these Fellows at the time they were recognized with their fellowships, click here.
Jorge Santiago Arce
PERFORMING ARTIST
Anjimile Chithambo
Musician
Shaumba-Yandje Dibinga
Dancer / Performer
Robert Gibbs
Muralist
Ashe Gordon
Musician/Violist
Arthur Halvorsen
Ceramicist
Yara Liceaga-Rojas
Poet / Performer
Porsha Olayiwola
Poet
Oompa
Musician
Valerie Stephens
Performing Artist / Storyteller
Billy Dean Thomas
Musician
Kyla Toomey
Ceramicist
2017 Brother Thomas Fellows
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| Jean Appolon Choreographer/Dance Educator |
Sandeep Das Musician |
Maya Erdelyi Animator/Director |
Maria Finkelmeier Percussionist/Composer |
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| Patrick Gabridge Playwright/Author |
Regie Gibson Performer/Poet |
Stephen Hamilton Visual Artist/Educator |
Kathryn King Ceramic Artist/Teacher |
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| Shaw Pong Liu Violinist/Composer |
Marsha Parrilla Choreographer |
Hakim Raquib Photographer |
Evelyn Rydz Visual Artist |
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| Enzo Silon Surin Poet |
Yu-Wen Wu Interdisciplinary Artist |
2015 Brother Thomas Fellows
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| Nicole Aquillino Ceramic Artist |
Halsey Burgund Sound Artist and Musician |
Danielle Legros Georges Poet |
Raúl Gonzalez III Visual Artist |
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| Napoleon Jones-Henderson Visual Artist |
Masako Kamiya Visual Artist |
Balla Kouyaté Composer/Musician |
Sandrine Schaefer Performance Artist |
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| Michelle Seaton Author |
Jae Williams Filmmaker |
2013 Brother Thomas Fellows
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| Ambreen Butt Visual Artist |
Lorraine Chapman Choreographer |
Sean Fielder Choreographer |
Ekua Holmes Visual Artist |
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| Matti Kovler Composer |
Megumi Naitoh Ceramic Artist |
2011 Brother Thomas Fellows
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| Sachiko Akiyama Sculptor |
Angela Cunningham Ceramic Artist |
David Valdes Greenwood Playwright/Author |
Wendy Jehlen Dancer |
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| Chandra Dieppa Ortiz Painter/Sculptor |
Robert Todd Documentary Filmmaker |
2009 Brother Thomas Fellows
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| John Oluwole ADEkoje Filmmaker/Playwright |
Kati Agócs Composer |
Barbara Helfgott Poet |
Richard Hoffman Poet |
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| Brian Knep Video Artist |
Alla Kovgan Dance-based Filmmaker |
Tracy Heather Strain Documentary Filmmaker |
Heather White Jeweler/Designer |
The artists who have received fellowships to date are extraordinary. They, along with all future Fellows, will make tremendous contributions to the art world over the course of their lives, and will enrich our community in ways we can only imagine.