FOR IMMEDATE RELEASE
July 7, 2015
Media Contact:
Milly Hough, mhough@arts.sc.gov
(803) 734-8698
South Carolina Arts Commission Announces FY2016 Artist Fellowships
COLUMBIA, S.C. – The South Carolina Arts Commission Board has awarded Individual Artist Fellowships to four South Carolina artists in the categories of visual arts, craft, music: composition and music: performance. Each artist receives $5,000.
This year's fellows:
- Visual Arts: Jarod Charzewski, Charleston County
- Craft: Alice Ross Ballard, Greenville County
- Music Composition: Jon Jeffrey Grier, Greenville County
- Music Performance: Marina Lomazov, Richland County
Fellowships recognize and reward the artistic achievements of South Carolina's exceptional individual artists. Fellowship awards are made through a highly competitive, anonymous process and are based on artistic excellence only. The fellowship awards bring recognition that may open doors to other resources and employment opportunities.
“It is rewarding to honor the work of successful artists, who are central to the creative industries in our state. Their accomplishments inspire other creative individuals and entrepreneurs, and they serve as positive examples of our state’s culture and thriving arts community,” said S.C. Arts Commission Executive Director Ken May.
The S.C. Arts Commission board approves fellowships based on recommendations made by out-of-state review panelists, who select fellows based solely on a review of anonymous work samples. This year's visual arts and craft judges were Alida Fish, photographer and professor emerita at the College of Art and Design, University of the Arts in Philadelphia; Christopher Schmidt, artist and director of the Schmidt-Dean Gallery in Philadelphia.; and Mi-Kyoung Lee, artist and associate professor of Crafts and head of Fibers at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. The music composition and performance judges were Robert Tanner, composer and faculty member of the music department at Morehouse College in Atlanta; and Helen Kim, violinist, assistant concertmaster of the Atlanta Opera Orchestra and faculty member at Kennesaw State University.
Individual artists working in poetry, prose, dance choreography or dance performance may apply for the FY2017 fellowship awards. Applications open Aug. 3, 2015, and the deadline to apply is Nov. 1, 2015.
For more information about S.C. Arts Commission programs and services, visit www.SouthCarolinaArts.com or call (803) 734-8696.
(Bios follow.)
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Visual Arts Fellow
Jarod Charzewski is an Associate Professor of Sculpture at the College of Charleston. He grew up in the inner city of Winnipeg, where the attitudes and esthetics of an urban setting took hold and where he gained appreciation for natural and manufactured landscapes. He fuels his art with visuals of seasons and recreates aesthetics that investigate mankind’s evolving influence.
He holds a BFA from the University of Manitoba (1996) and an MFA from the University of Minnesota (2005). He has received grants from several U.S. and Canadian arts organizations including the Manitoba Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts. He has been awarded residencies and solo and group exhibition opportunities across the U.S. and Canada, including at Kutztown University in Kutztown, Pa., the Bunnell Art Center in Homer, Alaska, The Halsey Institute, the South Carolina Biennial at 701 Center for Contemporary Art and the South Rim Artist in Residence Program at the Grand Canyon. He was also invited to exhibit his large scale work in the Quebec Biennial, Manif d' Art 7.
Craft Fellow
Alice Ross Ballard’s work is in the collections of the Smithsonian Institution's Renwick Museum in Washington DC, Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, the Mint Museum, the Greenville County Museum of Art, the Tweed Museum (University of Minnesota), the Medical University of South Carolina and the State Art Collections of the South Carolina Arts Commission and the Tennessee Arts Commission, along with numerous private and corporate collections. She has had numerous solo and group exhibitions, including at the Mint Museum of Art, the Greenville County Museum of Art, University of North Carolina Asheville, Pickens County Museum and the Sumter County Gallery of Art. Her work was selected for the 2011 South Carolina Biennial at 701 Center for Contemporary Art, and she was one of only 30 contemporary craft artists chosen for the traveling exhibition "Tradition/Innovation: American Masterpieces of Southern Craft and Traditional Art," organized by South Arts and funded by the National Endowment for the Arts.
From 2001-2011, she was instructor of ceramics at the Governor's School for Arts and Humanities. She has conducted workshops at Cullowhee (Western N.C. University), Penland School of Crafts, Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, the Mint Museum, the Greenville County Museum of Art, and the Bascom (Highlands, N.C.), among others. She received a Fulbright Grant to study in India and was one of eight international ceramic artists to be invited to the International Ceramic Colony in Resen, Macedonia. Ballard received a South Carolina Arts Commission Individual Fellowship in 2002.
Ballard holds a Bachelor's degree in design and a Master's degree in painting from the University of Michigan.
Music: Composition Fellow
Composer Jon Jeffrey Grier has been Composer in Residence and Instructor of Music Theory at the Greenville Fine Arts Center, a magnet high school of the arts in Greenville, since 1988. Grier composes frequently for FAC student and faculty performers and also mentors the Fine Arts Center Composers’ Society and the Foothills GreenArtists, a student environmental action club. He has been named Teacher of the Year three times and received the 2015 Carl Blair Award for Commitment to Arts Education from the Greenville Metropolitan Arts Council.
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Awards include grants from ASCAP, the Surdna Foundation, the Metropolitan Arts Council, and the Atlanta Chamber Players, and commissions from the Kandinsky Trio, the Emrys Foundation, and the Michigan Music Teachers Association. He has published more than 30 works for piano, chamber ensembles, voice, band, orchestra, and jazz ensembles. Grier has also performed as a writer/keyboardist with jazz groups in Greenville.
Grier holds a B.A. from Kalamazoo College, an M.M. in Composition from Western Michigan University, and an M.M. in Music Theory and a D.M.A. in Composition from the University of South Carolina, where he studied with Jerry Curry, Dick Goodwin, and Sam Douglas.
Music: Performance
Marina Lomazov is Ira McKissick Koger Professor of Piano at the University of South Carolina School of Music where she is founder and artistic director of the Southeastern Piano Festival. Praised by critics as “a diva of the piano” (The Salt Lake City Tribune), Lomazov has received numerous prizes during competitions, including the Cleveland International Piano Competition, William Kapell International Piano Competition, Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition, and Hilton Head International Piano Competition.
Lomazov has given major debuts in New York (Weill-Carnegie Hall), Boston (Symphony Hall), Chicago (Dame Myra Hess Concert Series), Los Angeles (LACMA Sunday Live series), Shanghai (City Theater), and Kiev (Kiev International Music Festival). She has performed as soloist with the Boston Pops, Rochester Philharmonic, Eastman Philharmonia, Chernigov Philharmonic (Ukraine), KUG Orchester Graz (Austria), Bollington Festival Orchestra (England), Piccolo Spoleto Festival Orchestra, Brevard Festival Orchestra, and the South Carolina Philharmonic. Lomazov holds degrees from the Juilliard School and the Eastman School of Music, the latter bestowing upon her the highly coveted Artist’s Certificate – an honor the institution had not given a pianist for nearly two decades. She has served as jury member for the Cleveland International Young Artists Piano Competition, Hilton Head International Piano Competition, Eastman International Piano Competition, Minnesota International Piano e-Competition, and National Federation Biennial Young Artist Auditions and is a National Panelist for the National Foundation for Advancement of the Arts, the organization that nominates Presidential Scholars in the arts.
Lomazov performs widely as a member of the Lomazov/Rackers Piano Duo. She and her husband and duo partner, Joseph Rackers, formed the duo in 2005 after gathering significant attention as Second Prize winners at the Sixth Biennial Ellis Competition for Duo Pianists, the only national duo piano competition in the United States at that time. Lomazov is a Steinway artist and was gifted a Steinway grand piano by the citizens of Columbia, S.C., in a 2009 surprise ceremony.
About the S.C. Arts Commission:
The South Carolina Arts Commission is the state agency charged with creating a thriving arts environment that benefits all South Carolinians, regardless of their location or circumstances. Created by the South Carolina General Assembly in 1967, the Arts Commission works to increase public participation in the arts by providing services, grants and leadership initiatives in three areas: arts education, community arts development and artist development. Headquartered in Columbia, S.C., the Arts Commission is funded by the state of South Carolina, by the federal government through the National Endowment for the Arts and other sources.
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