WGXC-90.7 FM
Call for Applications to the Wave Farm Radio Artist Fellowship 2021/2022
Please click here for the current opportunity, with an application deadline of June 30, 2022
Engagement Period: September 2021 - May 2022
Stipend: $15,000
Location: Remote (w/ three visits to Wave Farm in Acra, NY) *
Application Deadline: June 30, 2021
Notification: July 2021
Wave Farm is delighted to announce a third year of the Radio Artist Fellowship, a nine-month, part-time engagement for a radio scholar and artist living and working in the United States. The Wave Farm Radio Artist Fellow will work closely with Wave Farm’s Executive Director, Galen Joseph-Hunter, and Artistic Director, Tom Roe. The Fellowship will also include communication with Mentors: Anna Friz, Joan Schuman, Neil Verma, and Gregory Whitehead.
A definition of Radio Art: Radio artists explore broadcast radio space through a richly polyphonous mix of practices, including poetic resuscitations of conventional radio drama, documentary, interview and news formats; found and field sound compositions reframed by broadcast; performative inhabitations/embodiments of radio’s inherent qualities, such as entropy, anonymity and interference; playful celebrations/subversions of the complex relationship between senders and receivers, and the potential feedback loops between hosts and layers of audience, from in-studio to listeners at home to callers-in; use of radio space to bridge widely dispersed voices (be they living or dead), subjects, environments and communities, or to migrate through them in ways that would not be possible in real time and space; electroacoustic compositions with sounds primarily derived from gathering, generating and remixing radiophonic sources.
The Fellowship will combine remote work with three on-site visits to Wave Farm’s research library and radio studios.* Located in New York’s Upper Hudson Valley, Wave Farm is a nonprofit arts organization driven by experimentation with broadcast media and the airwaves. A pioneer of the Transmission Arts genre, Wave Farm programs provide access to transmission technologies and support artists and organizations that engage with media as an art form. Wave Farm’s WGXC 90.7-FM: Radio for Open Ears is a full-power, creative community radio station in New York’s Upper Hudson Valley. The WGXC program schedule features original content by over one-hundred volunteer programmers, and commits significant daytime listening hours to radio art and experimental sound.
*Details of the Wave Farm visit schedule will be determined in collaboration with the selected artist, with consideration given to any ongoing travel restrictions related to COVID-19.
Duties and Responsibilities:
Part 1: Radio Art Archive Work (September 2021 - January 2022)
The first five months of the fellowship, are focused on additions to the Wave Farm Radio Art Archive. (See wavefarm.org/radio/archive) The archive is an online resource and a broadcast series on Wave Farm’s WGXC 90.7-FM. It aims to identify, coalesce, and celebrate historical and contemporary international radio artworks made by artists around the world, created specifically for terrestrial AM/FM broadcast, whether it be via commercial, public, community, or pirate transmission. From September to January, the fellow will identify a minimum of one new work each week, preparing audio with introductions and back announcements for broadcast, as well as written work descriptions, and artist biographies. Where possible the fellow will also record an interview with the artist about their selected work. Each week the Fellow’s newest addition to the Archive will be broadcast on Wave Farm’s WGXC 90.7-FM. These works and interviews will also be integrated into Wave Farm’s nationally syndicated “The Radio Art Hour.”
Part 2: Community Engagement (February - March 2022)
The fellow will design and lead two workshops (or listening sessions) with WGXC programmers and interested members of the public. A successful model in 2020/2021 was constructed around the fellow identifying a single radio artwork and included three parts: 1) group listening and discussion 2) conversation with the artist behind the work 3) Participants creating their own radio artworks in response.
Part 3: Radio Art Creation (April - May 2022)
The Fellow will create their own original radio artwork(s) for broadcast, including a contribution to the Radia network, of which Wave Farm is a member (See radia.fm).
Fellowship Benchmarks:
- Weekly Meetings: with Wave Farm staff.
- Monthly Check-ins with Mentors for feedback on archive additions and the Fellow’s original radio artworks.
- Culminating Public Program: a live radio broadcast featuring the Fellowship artist and mentors in conversation reflecting on works created and archive selections.
To Apply:
Please send the following to info@wavefarm.org with the subject "Wave Farm Radio Artist Fellowship" by June 30, 2021:
- Letter of Interest: a one-page statement introducing your work as a radio scholar and artist demonstrating your personal interest in radio broadcast as a creative medium.
- Radio Art Archive Sample: Please prepare one example of a work you would add to the online archive and broadcast series (this should be a work by another artist, not your work). Please include:
(Please note that Wave Farm may broadcast these submissions in the future.)- A one- or two-paragraph description of the radio artwork.
- A mp3 (192 kbps, constant bitrate, 44.1kHz) audio file prepared for radio broadcast presentation that includes brief introductory remarks in your voice (identify yourself in the intro as well), the radio artwork itself, and a back announcement at the end telling radio listeners what they have just heard.
- A one- or two-paragraph biography of the artist you have selected.
- Your Own Radio Art Work Samples: Please provide links to two work samples of your own radio work.
- Resume / C.V.
Eligibility: The Radio Artist Fellowship program opportunity is open to individual radio artists and scholars whose primary residence is in the United States. (Note: applications from collaborative teams are not eligible.) The Fellowship stipend will appear as “Other Income” on 1099s issued in conjunction with tax years 2021 and 2022. Women and people of color are encouraged to apply.
Wave Farm’s Radio Artist Fellowship is made possible, in part, by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature; the National Endowment for the Arts; the Greene County Legislature through the County Initiative Program, administered in Greene County by CREATE (aka the Greene County Council on the Arts.)