Artist in Residence Fellowship Program 2026AiR
Fellowship Program 2026
Resident Artists
Akira Otsubo (Japan / Contemporary arts, Photography, Video)
Residency Period: May 5 – June 5, 2026
The main theme of my work is the relationship between memory and record, and I create using photography and film. I attempt to visualize the unclear and fluid images in human memory through techniques such as cyanotypes made from photographs taken with a large-format camera, collage, and movie. The processes of irregular grids, misregistration, and multiple exposure visually express the waves of time and memory. When we take a trip down memory lane, fragmentary images mix with other memories, and missing pieces are filled in by fresh experiences. Through my work, I explore the continuously flowing strata of memory in which past and present intersect.
Nell Ovitt (USA / Writing (Fiction & Script Writing))
Residency Period: June 1 – July 1, 2026
Nell Ovitt is a writer born in New York City, raised in Chapel Hill, NC, and based in Los Angeles. Her fiction and scripts center on the life cycles of individual and collective grief—she is particularly interested in how climate grief and personal loss mirror and intersect, and how both experiences can invite movement away from isolation and toward community. Ovitt has received support for work on her first novel from Wildacres Retreat in North Carolina, and was named a finalist in the 2025 Atlanta Film Festival screenplay contest for her TV drama pilot. Her short film script, GOOD LUCK, GRACIE!, directed by Julia Stamey, was shot in the fall of 2025 and is now in post-production. She earned her MFA in Screenwriting from Boston University and her BA in English from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
https://www.instagram.com/nellcyrene/
Jérémy Griffaud (France / Visual arts)
Residency Period: July 1 – July 31, 2026
Jérémy Griffaud is a visionary contemporary artist whose work resides at the dynamic intersection of traditional fine arts and cutting-edge immersive technology. Deeply invested in exploring the evolving role of the spectator in hybrid realities, Griffaud crafts experiences that seamlessly dissolve the boundaries between the physical world and the digital realm. Rather than treating viewers as passive observers, his practice insists on their active participation, making them integral components of the artwork’s activation and narrative evolution.
Beyond galleries and museums, his narrative-driven digital projects have also received critical acclaim in the film circuit. His project, Dungeon, secured dual international victories, winning prestigious awards at both the Boden Film Festival in Sweden and the Emerald Peacock Film Festival in St. Petersburg.
Ivana Chaloska (North Macedonia / Art, Design)
Residency Period:October 5 – November 5, 2026
My practice-based research intersects art and design with community engagement, yielding knowledge and artifacts within the spectrum of more-than-human inquiry. At present, my practice is grounded in attending to the tactile language of the landscape, articulated through its crusted, sedimentary topography – rocks. I grew up in a fishing village along one of Europe’s oldest lakes – Lake Ohrid, set amid the limestonic Mount Galichica. This proximity to waters and terrains in ceaseless reshaping, like a birthmark, imprinted inherent geophilia in my being. Consequently, my work unfolds through creative processes of material engagement with these landscapes. Methodologically, combining fieldwork, autoethnography, and abstracted reflection, I cultivate a disciplined practice of touching, sensing, noticing, and documenting tactile pasts and presents across the limestone.
Rica Shimabukuro (Japan / Art, Craft, Design)
Residency Period: November 4 – December 2, 2026
Since obtaining a Master of Fine Arts at Konstfack in Stockholm, my artistic activity has focused on papercuttings, which I create in an environmentally friendly and sustainable way. For me, memory and the passage of time are captivating eternal themes, which I fuse together with historical motifs and the present, inscribing all of these on paper. My work is part of a larger theme, which includes the question: how can I contribute to society as an artist using paper? Through the creation of large-scale works, I strive to bring a sense of peace, tranquility and hope to everyone, and I make it a point to proactively exhibit my work in hospitals and places of worship.
- Organizer: Akiyoshidai International Art Village
- Support: Yamaguchi Prefecture, Yamaguchi Board of Education, Mine City, Mine City Board of Education, Cultural Association of Yamaguchi Prefecture