Applications Open for First Annual Des Lee MFA Alumnx Residency

The Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts and Des Lee Gallery are launching the first annual Des Lee MFA Alumnx Residency this spring. The program aims to support practices that require time and space for research, experimentation, and audience engagement.

From May through September, the gallery will be activated as a space to create and present an exhibition, project, performance, or workshop. At the end of the program, the gallery will host an open studio event for the artist-in-residence.

Gallery Director Josh Stulen said, “This new residency will offer a Sam Fox School MFA alum the time and space to continue to exercise their artistic ideas. It’s an opportunity to use a gallery as a studio for an extended time to think through how a body of artwork or an individual project ultimately takes form as a public presentation.”

The residency is open to Sam Fox School MFA alumni who graduated 2019–2023, and includes an unrestricted honorarium of $3,000. Applications can be found online and are due Sunday, April 16.

The Des Lee Gallery, located in downtown St. Louis, is an entity of the Sam Fox School, serving to provide a formal gallery space for students and faculty as well as showing work by internationally known contemporary artists. It is named in honor of E. Desmond Lee, a 1940 graduate of WashU who provided significant support for the university, St. Louis, and the arts during his lifetime.