Wednesday Lemonade

April 15, 2020

Welcome back to Wednesday Lemonade, a community newsletter focused on keeping VCCA Fellows, staff, and supporters connected.

In today's issue, we encourage you to buy new books by VCCA Fellows; raise another glass of virtual lemonade via Facebook Live, this time with Executive Director Kevin O'Halloran; pass along a few more messages from Fellows; share a PBS video segment filmed at VCCA in January; and offer up a couple more resources established to serve artists during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Thank you to everyone who accepted last week's invitation to join us in Virtual VCCA . It's exciting to see conversations and a sense of community already beginning to bubble up in this new online space. We're eager to keep welcoming new members and watching this community grow.

Happy reading, and continued well wishes to all.
NEW THIS WEEK
Tend to Your Reading List
We invite you to go book browsing on our new VCCA Fellows Bookshop page featuring 2020-2021 book releases by VCCA Fellows whose launches, tours, readings, signings, etc. have b een affected by the coronavirus pandemic. 10% of all non-bookstore affiliate sales go to support participating ABA independent bookstores. Help us add your new book to the list.
HAPPENING NOW
 Virtual Lemonade, Executive Director Edition
Executive Director Kevin O'Halloran is live on Facebook right now to say hello and provide a few organizational updates from his home and remote office in Charlottesville, Virginia.

If this is anything like recent VCCA video conferences, Asta the dog is likely to make an appearance.
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FELLOW MESSAGES
Below are just a few of the many lovely responses we've collected so far.  Keep them coming! And keep an eye out for more message from Fellows elsewhere.
Amy Hoffman
"I was lucky enough to have a residency in mid-February, before the quarantines started. I think this gave me some good writing energy to take home with me. Since then, I've been revising a novel manuscript (I completed a first draft at VCCA); reading; walking; cooking; learning to bake bread."

Amy's article about AIDS, Corona, and Stonewall (which she worked on during her VCCA residency in February) was recently published in the Boston Review .
Jen P. Harris
"For the last two years I’ve been cannibalizing my own neglected and unfinished works on paper to make elaborate constructions on canvas and panel. Each new construction includes hundreds of cut bits and strips of these older ink paintings, assembled in new configurations and glued to supports. At the end of February I moved most of this work out of the studio for a show ( now "viewable" in an online viewing room ). I was all set to begin on a large multi-panel piece using this same method when Governor Newsom issued a stay-at-home order for the entire state of California. Although my studio is private, it’s in a shared building. As the crisis deepened, I stopped going to the studio and began working from home at a very small table. It took a few weeks, but I finally started to get into the rhythm of a new drawing practice. The regularity of this modest practice is helping to keep me sane."
Nascuy Linares
"Be strong. Be patient. At this time we must remind ourselves of the importance of art in life. Art is our main weapon to survive. Right now we can place ourself from an unexpected point of view, this means a profound transformation and that's what art is all about: change."

Nascuy's first concert playing music for films (Once Upon a Time in Venezuela) at CPHDox in Copenhagen was cancelled.
VCCA FELLOWS IN THE MEDIA
Veronica Jackson
"I believe that art should be accessible to anyone who wants to approach it, look at it, make it, live with it."

VCCA was pleased to serve as a backdrop for visual artist Veronica Jackson's interview with PBS's The Art Scene. Filmed in January while Veronica was in residence at VCCA as a recipient of the Jacques and Natasha Gelman Fellowship , the episode aired on VPM last Thursday. Veronica's segment begins around the 9:45-minute mark.
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COVID-19 RESOURCES
For Writers Launching New Books:
A Mighty Blaze is doing excellent work to amplify new releases by writers publishing during the pandemic. Their guidelines to participate are pretty straightforward. Read their Welcome Letter for more information . Consider tagging VCCA in your #amightyblaze posts, so we can help signal boost as well.
For All Artists in Dire Need:
"To support artists during the COVID-19 crisis, a coalition of national arts grantmakers have come together to create an emergency initiative to offer financial and informational resources to artists across the United States. Artist Relief will distribute $5,000 grants to artists facing dire financial emergencies due to COVID-19; serve as an ongoing informational resource; and co-launch the COVID-19 Impact Survey for Artists and Creative Workers , designed by Americans for the Arts , to better identify and address the needs of artists."
STANDING INVITATIONS
Keep in Touch
🧡 Stay safe, and be well.