The Art Department recently received a professional practices curriculum grant through the Emily Hall Tremaine Family Foundation's Marketplace Empowerment for Artists (MEA) Program.
The program provides financial support for schools to develop graduate-level professional practice courses.
"This is an amazingly timely offer considering our ongoing discussions about offering our students stronger information for their post-school lives as artists," said Department Chair Tom Loeser. "A huge thanks to (Art Board of Visitor member) Joe Seipel for suggesting to the folks at the Tremaine Foundation that UW-Madison would be a good candidate for this program."
The Foundation awarded the Department with an initial planning grant for developing a new course, (Art 908) Career Tools and Strategies for Artists, that the Department began offering this year.
The course proposal submitted to the foundation could lead to additional funding for subsequent courses, with the expectation that the Department will secure permanent funding for the course, Loeser said.
The seminar course, taught by instructor Michael Velliquette (MFA 2000), focuses on developing career skills for visual artists to support themselves financially, organizationally, and creatively.
Numerous venues for exhibiting, promoting, producing and marketing work will be considered along with day-to-day management strategies for building a career-track studio practice.
"Though the emphasis will be on establishing a studio-based career, this course will also seek to expand one's sense of what their professional path can be – taking into account the hybrid forms arts-based careers can take in today’s world," Velliquette said.