It’s been three and a half months since I left MacDowell and I still think about it nearly every day. I wanted to write about my experience right after I returned, but everything that came to mind sounded completely sappy. That may still be the case, but I’ll try to keep the saccharine to a minimum. 🙂
(also, if you’re interested in reading about my experiences at other artist residencies you can check that out here)
I can’t think of a better way to experience my first winter after moving to New England. There was snow on the ground the entire time I was there. To say that property was picturesque is a major understatement. The 200 acre estate is dotted with 35 artist studios. Each one is unique in it’s architecture and purpose. Many of them are miniature versions of distinct architectural styles while others are simple cabins with a fireplace with all of the amenities an artist would need to do their work. My studio was called Watson. It’s a Georgian mansion built in 1916, shrunk down to the size of a studio apartment. It was absolutely perfect for me. There was a grand piano, huge desk, fireplace, grand chandelier, and a bed all in the same room. It sits atop a small hill surrounded by the forest and feels completely isolated. In fact, every studio’s location is selected with seclusion in mind.
After I settled in, I began to read the plaques hanging on the wall. I later learned that these were usually called tombstones and every resident artist at Watson over the past 100 years had written their name, discipline, and dates of their stay. There were dozens of tombstones with hundreds of names, many of which I recognized. Meredith Monk had stayed here several times, so had Richard Danielpour and Michael Torke. Among them was also the author Oliver Sacks, composer George Tsontakis and two of my past teachers, Daniel Kellogg and Yevgeniy Sharlat. Perhaps most notably was Leonard Bernstein. I was told that he wrote his Mass for JFK in Watson.
The name that carried the most weight for me was Amy Beach. She was among the very first residents of Watson in 1921 and had stayed there around a dozen times until her death in 1944. I learned that she was a friend of Mary MacDowell and was one of the prominent artists who helped bring this colony to the attention of the public in its early days. I could still feel her presence in this place. The historical weight that she and so many others had imbued was layered thick on the walls and had soaked down to the bones of this beautiful old house. The next day, I went to the MacDowell library and checked out every Amy Beach CD they had. I listened to her music late into the night in the hopes that I could invoke some of those good vibes for the rest of my stay. I think it worked.
I was exceptionally productive over the next five weeks. The music that I wrote had a kind of quality and focus that I often struggle to attain. It took me a little while to get used to having such long interrupted days, but I found a routine that worked for me. There isn’t really any kind of assigned structure or schedule here. Aside from meals being served/delivered at certain times, the residents are free to do whatever they want, when they want. Not all artist residencies are like this, but this approach works really well for me. I hit a similar stride when I was at Copland House a couple of years ago. However, the big difference here was the inspiration and friendship I found among the colony’s other residents.
I’ve always found inspiration in the work of artists from other disciplines. This is one of the things I was most excited about when I arrived at MacDowell. However, I had no idea just how substantial and lasting an impact they would have on me. I was the only composer there for the first five weeks of my stay. Most of the other residents were authors or visual artists. Each one of them had an endlessly fascinating story to tell and were truly exceptional in their field. Their ages ranged from 24 to 84, but this place has a spooky kind of equalizing effect. Whether you are a Nobel Prize winner or fresh out of grad school, we all exist on the same plane. Money doesn’t matter here. Neither does fame, awards, or pedigree. We are all simply artists trying to do our best work day after day. There is also a strong sense of openness and vulnerability that permeated every meal, every conversation, every game of ping pong. We often joked that we were at art camp, but I think there’s some truth to that. Discussions of our daily artistic triumphs and failures at the fireplace before dinner brought us close together and helped to form a bond that would hardly be possible in the real world. There was also something really reassuring about knowing that the emotional roller coaster of creating new work crosses all boundaries of disciplines, age, and experience. I made so many friends there and was consistently blown away by the profundity and quality of their art.
I became particularly close to our matriarch, Jean Valentine. With an outlook on life and understanding of the world that reaches far beyond anything I can even fathom, she became a kind of mother or grandmother figure to many of us. She’s a truly remarkable person and she helped me to see something in myself that I didn’t even know was there. I don’t know if it’s even possible, but I hope that I can be like her when I’m 84. She embodies wisdom, joy, and grace in everything that she does.
Lastly, the food here was absolutely amazing. Breakfast and dinner were served at Colony Hall. The meals were healthy, delicious, and the recipes came from around the world. Every dinner was an adventure (well, except for Mondays which was always burger night. Also very tasty) and the chef/kitchen staff put so much care into everything they prepared. Lunches were delivered to our studios every day in a cute little picnic basket. This was always a high point in my day. Blake (who’s been working at MacDowell since 1980 and is one of the sweetest people I’ve ever met) would roll up to my studio in his minivan around noon and quietly place the basket at my front door. I’d often try to catch his eye through my kitchen window to wave and say thank you, but more often than not, he was already halfway down the driveway, quickly making his rounds to every studio. I’m still not totally sure why, but I decided that I should shoot a quick video of me unpacking that first lunch… Then I did the same the next day and the next day until I had filmed every lunch that was delivered. There was something about that little bit of discovery and surprise that actually gave my creative work a little boost. It seemed to me that every detail about this place designed to do just that. From the secluded workspaces to the open studios and social gatherings in the evening, this place was the perfect formula for creative work. I’ll never forget my time here and I can honestly say that this experience changed me. I have a new perspective on how/why I create and have found renewed confidence in the work that I do.