To learn more about the Peyton Evans Artist Residency program, click here.

Click through below to see PEARs by month.

Oct-Nov 2021

Bree Gant
Alec Silberblatt
Catherine Weingarten

Nov-Dec 2021

Brad Abrahams
Aaron Cobbett
Julie Garcés

Dec-Jan 2022

Christie A. Cruise
Viet Dinh
Michele Van Maurik

Jan-Feb 2022

Mary Gauthier
Ilana Simons
Kate Snow

Feb-Mar 2022

Eric Chasalow
Irina Patkanian
Lisa D. Watson

Mar-Apr 2022

Justine Feron
Erika Higgins Ross
Katrin Huber

Apr-May 2022

Mant Bares
Cameron Meade
Ernest Shaw

2021/22 ARTISTS

For more information about the artist, please click on the image below.

Dec/Jan

Christie A. Cruise
Writer, Poet
Swansea, IL

color headshot of The Studios fiction writer Artist in Residence Dinh

Viet Dinh
Fiction Writer
Newark, DE

Michele Van Maurik
Painter
Oakville, Ontario Canada

Christie Cruise
Writer, Poet
Swansea, IL

Christie A. Cruise, Ph.D., is an author, educator, and social justice advocate. In 2019 she released her first book, It Don’t Hurt Now: My Journey of Self-Love & Self-Acceptance. Her poetry, reflections, and self-portrait photography has been published in Gumbo Magazine, Remington Review, Gallery & Studio Arts Journal, Sunspot Literary Journal, the International Women’s Writing Guild (IWWG) anthology Heels Into the Soil, and the IWWG Network edition Our Stories, Ourselves: Narratives from Black Women in Africa and America. Dr. Cruise has contributed to blogs for the Black Mental Wellness Corporation and The Healing Collective Global. She has served as a volunteer for St. Louis Children’s Hospital’s Raising St. Louis Program and Girls Incorporated of St. Louis, a mentor with the Reach & Rise Program of the Gateway Region YMCA, an advisory board member for Nia Kuumba African and African American Women’s Spirituality Center, and treasurer for the Young Ambassadors of the YWCA of Metro St. Louis. Dr. Cruise is currently a board member for the International Women’s Writing Guild.

"After Disasters" in white letters skyscape background Viet Dinh novel

Viet Dinh
Fiction Writer
Newark, DE

color headshot of The Studios fiction writer Artist in Residence Dinh

Viet Dinh was born in Vietnam and grew up in Colorado. He attended Johns Hopkins University and the University of Houston and currently teaches at the University of Delaware. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Delaware Division of the Arts, as well as two O. Henry Prizes and the Alice Hoffman Prize for Fiction from Ploughshares. His stories have appeared in Zoetrope: All-Story, Witness, Fence, Five Points, Chicago Review,  Threepenny Review, and Best American Non-Required Reading 2017. His debut novel, After Disasters, a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Prize, was released in 2016.

Michele Van Maurik
Painter
Oakville, Ontario Canada

Michele Van Maurik is an award winning and internationally recognized artist from Oakville, Ontario.  She is best known for her bold, luminous, larger than life florals and known as the “Painter of petals”. Her work quickly garnered international attention, where she was recognized by the Arts, Sciences  and Lettres academy of Paris and awarded with a Silver  and most recently a Vermeil medal for excellence in painting.  Selected to be part of the Canadian delegation, Michele has exhibited four times at the prestigious Society National des Beaux Arts at the Louvre in Paris. In addition, she was invited by Marina Picasso to show her work at the Artistes du Monde, which took place in Cannes.  Attention to detail, mastery of light and colour are the driving forces behind her paintings. Featured in numerous publications such as: American Art Collector, Arabella Magazine and international artist, It is Michele’s goal to have her paintings uplift and capture the beauty, hopefulness and positivity we all need during these challenging times.