Residents: 2024

Composer and violinist Tommy Dougherty is a native of Pittsburgh, PA, and composer of orchestral, chamber, and solo works. The Orchestra of St. Luke’s recently premiered Impro-Vice (2023) by Tommy. His music has been performed by the Johnstown Symphony Orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, Modern Violin Ensemble, and Alarm Will Sound, and he is the recipient of three ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards. He is a Maker-Creator Scholar at the Winterthur Museum where his collaboration with violist and historian Alexandra Cade, The Winterthur Suite, exists as part of the 2024 Winterthur Transformations exhibit.

Janet Johnson is an international award-winning pastel artist. She has been accepted into countless art exhibits from local to international in scope, and has won more than fifty exhibition awards. She has art collectors nationwide. Janet has presented programs about pastels, and conducts workshops and private lessons in the pastel medium.

Gabriela Vieira da Cunha earned a Bachelor’s degree in Art History and Teaching Credential from CSULB in California. Born in Brazil, she loves music, dance and began writing poetry and keeping journals during adolescence to process experiences in her environment. Gabriela has traveled extensively and lived abroad to study and work and documented her experiences. As an educator, Gabriela finds joy serving students in the classroom and currently teaches English as a second language in adult education where students inspire her every day. Presently, Gabriela is working to complete her first book and continues to write poetry.

Linda Litteral is a multi-media artist and writer, working in sculpture, painting, drawing andinstallation, with an MFA from San Diego State University. She is an adjunct emeritus at multiplelocal community colleges and SDSU, Donovan Detention Facility and still teaches at Las ColinasDetention Center. She is member of Allied Craftsman and the Feminist Image Group which shewas director for 6 years. Her work has been shown locally, nationally and internationally. Litteral,attended a two-month residency at Centre Pompadour in France in 2018 and has beenattending Desert Dairy Residency in 29 Palms yearly since 2020.

Barbara DeMarco-Barrett is author of Palm Springs Noir (Akashic). Her stories are in Orange County Noir, Coolest American Stories, 2022, USA Noir: Best of the Akashic Noir Series, Rock, and A Hard Place, Dark City Crime Mystery Magazine, and Literary Hatchet. She received a Distinguished Instructors award from UC-Irvine and is adjunct professor of creative writing at Chapman University and Saddleback College. Pen on Fire: A Busy Woman’s Guide to Igniting the Writer Within, was a Los Angeles Times bestseller. She hosts the podcast Writers on Writing.

April - June 2024 Residents

Elizabeth L Silver is the author of the novel, The Majority (Riverhead), as well as the memoir, The Tincture of Time: A Memoir of (Medical) Uncertainty (Penguin Press), and the novel, The Execution of Noa P. Singleton (Crown). Her work has been called “fantastic” by the Washington Post, “masterful” by The Wall Street Journal, “important” by the Los Angeles Times, has been published in seven languages, and optioned for film. Elizabeth has written for The Washington Post, The Guardian, New York Magazine, Harper's Bazaar, Los Angeles Review of Books, McSweeney's, and others, and currently teaches creative writing with the UCLA Writers Program. She is the founder and director of Onward Literary and lives in Los Angeles with her family.

Amey Miller has published fiction, non-fiction, and translation in a number of journals, and has received numerous residencies at artists' colonies. In the short story "News," published in The American LIterary Review, she used a number of decorative elements as well as splices of different sources and pieces of story. She has continued in this vein, becoming a collagist of the page. In 2016 composer Miller and Christopher Preissing received an NEA-funded Chicago Artist Residency production grant using Miller's text. In 2020, she published Snakes, the first part of her text + image series Songs of All Other Birds.

Darby Saxbe is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Southern California, where she directs the doctoral training program in clinical psychology. She received her PhD from the University of California Los Angeles and completed an NIH-funded postdoctoral fellowship before joining the faculty at USC. She has published more than 60 scientific papers in peer-reviewed journals, received major early career awards, and completed a Fulbright fellowship in Spain to 2019. She is currently writing a popular press book on her research on the neurobiology of fatherhood, titled Dad Brain and forthcoming from Flatiron Books/MacMillan in 2026.

Vicky Delong has been creating art for about thirty years. In the ceramic genre, she creates objects in the hand-built slab technique. Vicky also creates art books; fabricating many bookstructures. Last year, Vicky took an online course with Fibre Arts Take Two learning techniques in the fiber arts genre. DeLong has been the Art Program Coordinator for Mission Trails RegionalPark, San Diego for their Visitor Center Art Gallery. She was on the staff at Front Porch Gallery, Carlsbad, CA June 2018 - 2023. Vicky has a studio (#1) in Spanish Village Art Center, Balboa Park, San Diego where she has been an artist member since 1997. She is currently the Gallery 21 Director at Spanish Village Art Center.

Composer and violinist Tommy Dougherty (b. 1990) is a native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and is a composer of orchestral, chamber, and solo works. This year, Tommy is in residence at the Winterthur Museum as a Maker-Creator Fellowship Scholar. In 2021, Tommy received a joint commission from the Johnstown Symphony Orchestra and Laurel Arts to compose a work as a tribute to the people of Somerset for the 20th Anniversary of September 11th. He has since been commissioned to write a new work for the JSO’s 2022-2023 season finale. As a violinist, Tommy currently serves as Acting Section Violin with the San Diego Symphony.

Nancy Marie Mithlo (Chiricahua Apache) is a professor of gender studies and core faculty with the American Indian Studies Interdepartmental program at the University of California, Los Angeles. Mithlo’s curatorial work has resulted in nine exhibits at the Venice Biennale. Mithlo has taught at the University of New Mexico, the Institute of American Indian Arts, the Santa Fe Community College, Smith College, California Institute of the Arts, Occidental College, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her 2020 book Knowing Native Arts was published by the University of Nebraska Press.

Kelly Dwyer is the author of three novels, including, most recently. GHOST MOTHER, and is a playwright whose plays have been produced in Los Angeles, New York, and Glasgow. A native of San Pedro, California, and a graduate of Oberlin College and The Iowa Writers' Workshop, Kelly divides her time between Wisconsin and Los Angeles. She is working on her fourth novel and a collection of flash fiction.

Noriko Nakada is a multi-racial Asian American who creates fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and art to capture the hidden stories she has been told not to talk about. Her memoir Through Eyes Like Mine, was shortlisted for the 2040 Book Award. Excerpts, essays, fiction, and poetry have appeared in Catapult, Meridian, Kartika, Hippocampus, and Linden Avenue. She is a member of the leadership team for Women Who Submit, an organization empowering women and non-binary writers to submit their work for publication.

Katherine Saviskas investigates ancestral reconnection, attempting to decolonize U.S. psychology such that time, blood, and traditions emerge as important or disappear, communities form, and radical aliveness flourishes. Through installation, photography, textiles, folk art, ritual, and social practice, she gathers where longing and play meet. In 2023, Katherine was a Rhizomatic Imagination Fellow with the Center for Story-based Strategy. In 2022, she was an Artist in Residence at Picture Berlin, in Germany. She is a Ph.D. candidate of East-West Psychology at the California Institute for Integral Studies in San Francisco, where she is pursuing the Creative Dissertation track.

Kendra Knight is an artist, photographer, and sustainability coordinator. Kendra has always had a passion for art and nature and how it harmonizes with our environment. Kendra also learned to produce art for a purpose and upcycle art as much as possible. Her passion for nature and art led her to Mammoth Lakes 22 years ago. Kendra was formerly the Director of Mono Arts Council (MAC), where she also taught art in schools and developed the Summer Art Camp for Kids. She also worked as the Mammoth Ski Museum Curator and Director. After working for the arts sector for over 20 years Kendra decided she would love to work in the environmental sector and use her creative knowledge to inspire others to support our Earth and local environment.

Melissa Yancy’s story collection, Dog Years (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016), was the winner of the Drue Heinz Literature Prize and a California Book Award and was longlisted for The Story Prize. Her short fiction has appeared in One Story, The Kenyon Review, ZYZZYVA, Prairie Schooner, The Missouri Review, and many other journals. The recipient of an NEA fellowship, Yancy works and lives in Los Angeles.

Patrick McGowan has had a dozen productions of his plays in Los Angeles and readings of his work in Los Angeles and New York. His play “FILM” based on the uneasy collaboration between Buster Keaton, Samuel Beckett, and Alan Schneider received three L.A. Weekly nominations including best play of the year. It was singled out by Stephen Leigh Morris on KPCC’s “Airtalk” as one of the best plays of 2008. His adaptation of Leonid Andreyev’s He Who gets Slapped For Singular Productions was recommended by the L.A. Weekly.

Rachel Turner is a photographer, educator, and Providence native. She uses film as a medium to take her photos. Film allows her to slow down, and connect with her environment. She uses photography and the editing process to communicate a feeling of wanderlust, and beauty in the everyday.

Mark Lee Webb makes his home in Louisville, Kentucky, but he grew up in Southern California. He’s a writer & photographer. His photography has been selected for the covers of journals and included in many juried exhibitions. Mark received his MFA from Queens University of Charlotte. His poetry and fiction can be found in many literary publications. He has two chapbooks published as well as one full-length book of poetry.

Ann Voorhees Baker started writing again just a few years ago, after a 40-year hiatus from her early efforts in her college years. Her short stories have been published in the Chicago Quarterly Review, Under the Sun, and elsewhere, and she’s received, among other awards, two writer's residencies at Dorland Mountain Arts Colony. She hosts an annual women’s writing retreat in the Catskills called Women At Woodstock, and has completed her first novel, and is working with an agent now. She lives with her husband in Southern California near the ocean.

Lauren Dougherty is a multi-disciplinary scholar and writer on the spectrum. They have a BA in Psychology from Mills College, an interdisciplinary Master’s in Cognitive Social Psychology and Conflict from NYU, and are currently the Dean’s Distinguished Fellow in the MFA at UCR.

Tammy Harris is an artist at heart, only lacking a few credits towards an art major in addition to her master's in special education. She is a prolific writer, artist, and photographer. Her passion for using her expertise to help others led her to create a thriving business at TammysTeachings.com. Tammy is currently writing a book called, " The Modern Parenting Guide: Raising Resilient, Adaptable, and Future-Ready Children Through an Unpredictable Future."

Michael Remson is an accomplished composer, librettist and author who has had works performed across the United States and in Europe. Among the many professional, college and high school groups that have performed his operas, choral and chamber music include Houston Grand Opera’s “Opera to Go” program, Lone Star Lyric Theater Festival, Houston Ballet Academy, Bulgarian Composers Collaborative, The Cameron Museum (Wilmington NC), Museum of Contemporary Craft (Portland OR), Abilene College Opera, Texas Tech Opera, and New York City Opera’ “Showcasing American Composers” series. Dr. Remson has authored two books on American music and has held numerous faculty appointments over his career.

Mike Brosnan a Los Angeles native, has a BA in film with a minor in journalism. After long stints writing scripts and poetry (studying under Eloise Klein Healy - LA’s first Poet Laureate in 2012), he turned his eye toward fiction. Mike has worked at the UCLA Film and Television Archive and in the development departments of producer Edward R. Pressman, producer/director Oliver Stone, and Miramax and is now at The Walt Disney Co. His essay on Irene Adler, a character in the Sherlock Holmes canon, is in the book, Ladies, Ladies: The Women in the Life of Sherlock Holmes, Aventine Press, 2007. In addition, he has been a wine director, wine bar manager and owned his own wine event planning business.

Violinist Jeff Thayer is currently the concertmaster of the San Diego Symphony and concertmaster and faculty member of the Music Academy of the West (Santa Barbara). Previous positions include assistant concertmaster of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, associate concertmaster of the North Carolina Symphony, and concertmaster of the Canton (OH) Symphony Orchestra. He graduated from the Cleveland Institute of Music, the Eastman School of Music, and the Juilliard School Pre-College Division. Awards include the Stephen Hahn/Lillybelle Foundation Award in Violin from the Music Academy of the West, the Starling Foundation Award, the George Eastman Scholarship, and the Performer's Certificate from the Eastman School of Music.

Aazam Irilian is a Los Angeles based multidisciplinary artist inspired to bridge the gap between art and science. Irilian pushes the limits of her medium and is constantly seeking new possibilities to reveal the complexity and beauty of nature. Using mineral solutions and salts, she creates captivating textures and effects that add depth and interest in her work. She was featured artist at MOAH-CEDER in 2015. Her works have been showcased in solo exhibitions such as "Preserved Memories," Los Angeles and "Stillness in Chaos," San Diego, and group exhibitions such as the MOAH, Lancaster, and Oceanside Museum of Art, Oceanside.

Julia Mary Gibson grew up by the magical lakes of the North American Midwest, or occupied Anishinaabe territory, where her novel COPPER MAGIC takes place. She writes about the ways that human civilization intersects with mysterious wild nature and the sacred responsibilities we have to each other and to the planet. Dorland has been an instrumental element in manifesting her work. She lives in Hollywood, California, surrounded by her extended family of poets, thespians, dancers, illustrators, filmworkers, and urban farmers.

Emma Claire Sweeney was named an Amazon Rising Star and Hive Rising Writer for her novel, Owl Song at Dawn, which later won Nudge Literary Book of the Year. Emma co-wrote A Secret Sisterhood: The hidden friendships of Austen, Brontë, Eliot and Woolf with Emily Midorikawa. In her foreword, Margaret Atwood described the work as a great ‘service to literary history’. Emma has won Society of Authors, Arts Council and Royal Literary Fund awards, and has written for the likes of The Paris Review, TIME, and The Washington Post. Emma directs the Ruppin Agency Writers’ Studio – a literary mentorship program.

Catie Disabato has published two novels, "U Up?" and "The Ghost Network." She lives in Los Angeles.

Cass Cross is a writer and educator. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Florida State University and she has been the recipient of writing residencies at Centrum, the Whiteley Center, and Casa Libre en la Solana. Her recent work explores motherhood, womanhood, and art history. A member of the English Department at Bellevue College since 2010, she also serves as faculty advisor and editor for the campus literary magazine, Belletrist, and facilitates art discussions for people with memory loss at the Frye Museum in Seattle.

Darcy Vebber writes fiction and personal essays. She teaches fiction writing at Art Division, a nonprofit school for under-served young adults, and Writing Workshops L.A. Her work has been published in the Iowa Review, Tribe Magazine, The Jewish Journal, and others. She had a BA in Film from USC and an MFA from Otis College of Art and Design.

Susan Davies is a painter working mainly in oil and acrylics. She received a BA in Art and Education from Gustavus Adolphus College, St. Peter, MN (1982) and a MA in Curriculum Design from St. Mary’s University of MN (1995). She also studied at Temple University’s Tyler School of Art, Rome, Italy (1981); at the Women’s Art Institute, Minneapolis College of Art and Design (2004). Susan is interested in our connection to our natural surroundings with a special focus on water and water preservation. Davies is represented by Artactile Gallery and Everett & Charlie, both in Minneapolis.

Al Denyer works with visual translations of mapping and mark making in her drawing and painting practice. Al holds an MFA from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, and a BA Honors from Winchester School of Art, England.

A ‘Utah Artist Fellowship Award recipient, Al has received numerous grants for her ongoing research and shown in many national and international juried and invitational exhibitions. Al has received public art commissions and recently contributed a portrait for the ‘Work in Progress’ Mural, the National Portrait Gallery, London, England.

Al Denyer is a Professor of Painting and Drawing, at the University of Utah.

Ja'net Danielo is the author of This Body I Have Tried to Write, winner of the MAYDAY 2022 Poetry Micro Chapbook Editors' Choice Award, and The Song of Our Disappearing (Paper Nautilus, 2021. A recipient of a Professional Artist Fellowship from the Arts Council for Long Beach and the Fischer Prize, her poems have appeared in Frontier Poetry, Mid-American Review, GASHER, Radar Poetry, and elsewhere. Originally from Queens, NY, Ja'net teaches at Cerritos College and lives in Long Beach, CA, where she facilitates Word Women, a free poetry workshop series for cancer patients and survivors.

Simona Supekar teaches English and Creative Writing at Pasadena City College in the Los Angeles area. She has been published in The Atlantic, Los Angeles Review of Books, Santa Fe Writers Project Quarterly, and more. Her novel manuscript was a finalist for the 2021 PEN/Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction. At Dorland, she will be working on Stock Photo, a book in the Object Lessons series published by Bloomsbury. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from UCR-Palm Desert and lives in Los Angeles, California, with her husband and young child.

Melanie Thorne is the author of the novel Hand Me Down (PRH), acclaimed by People, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the Associated Press, among others, and named a Kirkus Reviews Best Fiction Book of the Year. Her short fiction and non-fiction have appeared in Good Housekeeping, Hayden’s Ferry Review, The Florida Review, and elsewhere. She received the Maurice Prize in Fiction, an Alva Englund Fellowship, residencies at VCCA, Hedgebrook and the Atlantic Center for the Arts, earned an MA in Creative Writing from UC Davis, and was a PENCenter Emerging Voices Mentor.

Michael Jon Fink’s instrumental and electronic music has been performed at numerous concerts and festivals throughout the United States, Europe, and Japan. His works appear on the Cold Blue, Contagion, C.R.I., Trance Port, Raptoria Caam, and Wire Tapper labels. He has composed concertos for soprano saxophone, bass clarinet, violin, and cello, as well as incidental music for two plays of W. B. Yeats and five plays by Wajdi Mouawad. He has been a composer/improviser with experimental and new music groups that have included The Negative Band, Stillife, The Feedback Wave Riders, and Trio Ampliphonic. For over 40 years Fink has served on the music faculty of the California Institute of the Arts where he teaches composition, orchestration, and analysis.

Sharon O’Brien teaches creative writing and American Studies at Dickinson College in Carlisle, PA. She has long been drawn to life stories and the process of storytelling. Her first book was a biography of Willa Cather (Willa Cather: The Emerging Voice, 1987) that was the first to explore this writer’s life from a feminist point of view. Her second book, The Family Silver (2004) was a memoir of family and depression that explored the concept of inheritance in a cultural context. Recently she has been writing personal essays that address such topics as the American cult of productivity, the politics of the food industry, and American attitudes toward grief. She is working on an academic memoir that explores how academic writing is shaped by history and politics.

Julie Weaverling is a Southern California artist working in painting, fiber art, and conceptual art. Her art has been exhibited nationally and internationally. Julie strives to uplift while creating beauty in her work without it having to be pretty. Julie is the founder of the global art project, Lift the Sky which offers a hopeful outlook for the future and invites artists to respond to the question, “What’s your message to the world?” As Front Porch Gallery Director she curated and juried exhibits, worked with regional/national artists, and created programming for Front Porch retirement communities including numerous large-scale collaborative projects.

Mark Rumsey is an artist working in social situations and spatial manipulations. His work has been exhibited throughout the United States as well as internationally. The manifestations of his work take on many forms including site-specific installation, relational engagements, and live performance. Rumsey earned a BFA in Ceramics and Philosophy and an MFA in Printmaking. Rumsey engages internationally in the role of Artist-in-residence including at Tlacopac International Artist Residency (Mexico), Buinho Association, (Portugal), The Swatch Art Peace Hotel (China), Rondo Atelier (Austria), The Studios of Key West (USA), Frans Masereel Centrum (Belgium), Carvansarai (Turkey), and Global Arts Village (India).

Gail Werner is a Native American painter and printmaker who descends from three tribes located in San Diego County: Cupeño, Luiseño, and Kumeyaay. She lives and works in Long Beach, California, and holds an MFA in drawing and painting from California State University, Long Beach. Her work reflects a love for the Southern California landscape along with elements from her Native culture. In 2023 she completed a mural commissioned by Murals of La Jolla. In 2022 she was in an exhibit, "Voices from the Rez," at the La Jolla Historical Society.

Tony Eprile is a South African writer & photographer now living in Vermont. His novel, The Persistence of Memory, was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, longlisted for the Dublin Impac Prize, and won the Koret International Jewish Book Award for Fiction. His writing has appeared in O Magazine, The New York Times, Details, The Nation, Gourmet, and the Washington Post. His photographs have appeared in Discover Magazine, The Christian Science Monitor, National Geographic (online), Gourmet, Pacific Standard, and elsewhere. Awards include National Endowment for the Arts, Ingram Merrill Foundation, Djerassi Foundation, MacDowell Colony and other fellowships.

Hazel Kight Witham is a mother, writer, teacher, artist and slam coach who leads workshops on building a sustainable teaching practice. Her poetry, memoir, fiction, and interviews can be found in The Sun, Bellevue Literary Review, Made in L.A. Volumes 4 & 5, High Country News, Mutha Magazine, Integrated Schools, United Teacher, Cultural Weekly, and Rising Phoenix Review. Hazel’s work explores issues of wellness, mental health, healing, social justice and peace-making. She earned a B.A. from Brown University and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Antioch University LA, and has been a proud member of Women Who Submit since 2016.

Jessica O’Dwyer is the author of Mother Mother (National Indie Excellence Award novel finalist) and Mamalita: An Adoption Memoir (winner, San Diego Book Award for memoir). Her writing has appeared in the New York Times Motherlode blog, San Francisco Chronicle, Scary Mommy, Mutha; and aired on public radio. Jessica is part of the Alumni Circle of Antioch Los Angeles, where she received her MFA; as well as a member of the Bay Area “Write On Mamas.” She has taught memoir workshops for adoptive families and leads a bimonthly meeting of parents with a focus on books that address adoption.

Laura Schmitt (she/her) is a multiracial writer with roots in Hawai’i and the Midwest. Her fiction can be found in the New England Review, The Pinch, Boulevard, Indiana Review, The Florida Review, and elsewhere. She was a finalist for the New England Review‘s 2021 Award for Emerging Writers, received a 2019 Hedgebrook residency, and holds an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. Laura was born in Southern California and currently lives in Los Angeles, where she is at work on a novel and a collection of stories.

An author with three novels and two story collections, Victoria Patterson lives with her family in South Pasadena and teaches fiction at Antioch University’s Master of Fine Arts Program.

Alyson Earnest is a 3rd generation creative and insatiably curious world traveler. Her passion for writing is grounded in more than 30 years of daily journaling where she believes she has gained much of her wisdom, and yet so much more from her solo travel journeying across the US by car and throughout 6 continents beyond. She is currently writing her first memoir based on what happened when she left her cul-de-sac in 2018 and began to discover the rich, vast, fascinating world beyond. Alyson is living her mantra that proclaims: She is going places she has never been.

Jac Jemc teaches creative writing at UC San Diego and is a 2023 Guggenheim Fellow. She is the author of three novels and two collections of stories. Her novel Empty Theatre (MCD x FSG 2023)received starred reviews in Kirkus and Booklist and was featured on NPR’s Weekend Edition. Her story collection False Bingo (MCD x FSG Originals 2019) won the Chicago Review of Books Award for fiction and was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Speculative Fiction and longlisted for The Story Prize. Her other books include The Grip of It, MyOnly Wife, named a finalist for the 2013 PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for debut Fiction and winner of the Paula Anderson Book Award), and A Different Bed Every Time.

Ryan Smith is a musician, educator, and researcher in nanoscale physics. His creative work focuses on making physics ideas accessible to anyone who is curious, engaging with how experiences with music and nature relate to science. Beyond his research, he has published several popular and educational articles about physics and is currently developing a nonfiction work “Play Outdoors like a Scientist," aiming to inspire deep wonder from seeing the outdoor world through a scientific lens. Ryan was a recent 2021-22 Alexander von Humboldt scholar in Berlin, Germany, and is currently a tenured physics professor at California State University East Bay.

Dian Greenwood has been writing novels since the 80s. She studied writing at San Francisco State University and worked further with Janet Fitch (WHITE OLEANDER) and Tom Spanbauer (THE MAN WHO FELL IN LOVE WITH THE MOON). Her debut novel, ABOUT THE CARLETON SISTERS was launched from She Writes Press in mid-June 2023 at age 81. Her historical/immigrant novel, FOREVER BLACKBIRDS, was released from Travelers Moon Press in May of 2024. She is currently working on a sequel to that novel, SAFEKEEPING, due out in 2025 and has out on submission, BERT & EILEEN with a hopeful 2026 release from a yet undesignated press. Dorland is her happy place to write and she's hopeful of a summer 2024 return.

Librecht Baker’s writings alter/altar the personal, communal, and incorporate knowledge of West African drum and dance culture and an African Traditional Religion. Baker’s “After Life or Bust” was part of Q Youth Foundation’s 2022 “Eastside Queer Stories: Radio Plays” and “Taciturn Beings” was part of Vagrancy Theater’s 2019 BLOSSOMING: New Play Reading Series. Baker is part of the Ragdale, Lambda Literary Writer’s Retreat, and VONA/Voices communities. Baker’s poetry is included in Sinister Wisdom 107, Solace: Writing, Refuge, & LGBTQ Women of Color (BLF Press), etc. Baker authored vetiver (Finishing Line Press), is a Ph.D candidate, and an adjunct/lecturer.Type your paragraph here.

Eliot Jordan is a professional tea taster, and singer-songwriter. After a lifetime cupping and buying tea, recording and performing his songs, and composing two musicals, he now returns to his love of prose. His debut fantasy novel, The Aether Glass, is in no small part inspired by his career in the international tea trade, blending his love of literature and history with exposure to Asia's fascinating rural cultures. Three Turns of the Sun, the second in a series of linked stories, is currently in the rewriting stage. He lives in his native Berkeley, California.

Hannah Keefe is a metalsmith and visual artist known primarily for her one-of-a-kind handmade jewelry pieces. With a fine arts education and years working in the visual arts, she approaches her studio jewelry-making with a sculptor’s eye. For the past 2 decades, Hannah has maintained a rigorous studio practice concentrated around the material exploration of brass chain and silver solder. Her jewelry is sold at galleries and boutiques around the world.

January - March 2024 Residents

Christine Benda is a fiction writer with an MFA in writing from Antioch University, Los Angeles. While in graduate school she received the Eloise Klein Healy Scholarship. Christine is the recent recipient of the inaugural AULA Alumni Circle Dorlands Arts Prize for an excerpt from her novel in progress: We Ride Under the Same Stars. She works full time as a Lighting Technician for film and television and writes part time, but aspires to flip that script. When not lighting films or writing you will find Christine hiking, playing tennis, cooking, and pampering her two masters known to most as her cats.

Sarah Z. Sleeper's debut novel, Gaijin, came out in 2020 with glowing reviews. Her short story, “A Few Innocuous Lines,” won an award from Writer’s Digest. Her non-fiction essay, “On Getting Vivian,” was published in The Shanghai Literary Review, and her poetry was exhibited at the Bellarmine Museum. In the recent past, she was an editor at New Rivers Press and editor-in-chief of the literary journal Mason’s Road. Prior to completing her MFA in 2012, she was a reporter, winning three journalism awards and a fellowship at the National Press Foundation.

Mina Manchester is an Editorial Assistant at Great Place Books and received her MFA from the Sewanee School of Letters. Her fiction, humor and essays have been featured in Electric Literature, HuffPost, The Evergreen Review, Columbia Journal, The Normal School, and Inscape. A Scandinavian American originally from Seattle she lives in Los Angeles where she’s at work on a novel and story collection.

Leland Cheuk is an award-winning author of three books of fiction, most recently the novel NO GOOD VERY BAD ASIAN. Cheuk’s work has appeared in publications such as The Washington Post, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, NPR, Salon, among other outlets. He’s been awarded fellowships at MacDowell, Hawthornden Castle, Djerassi, and elsewhere. He is the founder of the indie press 7.13 Books and lives in Los Angeles. You can follow him on Twitter @lcheuk and at lelandcheuk.com.

Cindy Zimmerman is a Southern California painter and placemaker with an MFA from UC SanDiego Visual Arts Department and a BFA from Oklahoma University. Other professional creditsinclude: member of Feminist Image Group, Adjunct Emeritus at various community colleges, co-founder of Fern Street Circus, museum worker, and K-12 resident artist. Born the oldest of eightCatholic girls in fundamentalist Oklahoma, she navigated variable realities. At 30, migrating toCalifornia, she oriented herself by creating an imaginary mashup of the two very differentcultures. Contributing to community-based art has kept her grounded and inspired.

Wisconsin-based author and poet Carrie Voigt Schonhoff has self-published two poetry books titled, 'The Liminal Space' and 'The End of the Beginning.' She was widowed in 2012 and that life challenge has taught her many things, some of which she writes about in her books. Her work addresses the importance of healing, moving on, and being ready to face a new beginning. She believes that we can all connect and understand one another on a deeper level through poetry. Carrie recently completed her first book tour and looks forward to continuing her travels and sharing her poetry with the world.

Anne Canright has an MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University. She was a contributing writer to Coast & Ocean magazine for many years, and now has shifted her attention to poetry, and essays, and has begun work on a novel/linked story collection about WWII Los Angeles, Manzanar, and art.

Anita Zachary holds an MFA from San Diego State University in creative writing with an emphasis in Fiction Writing. She is also an Assistant Professor in the Writing and Rhetoric Dept. at Occidental College. Her work had appeared in Windmill, Raising Mothers, and Poetry International. She is currently working on a memoir. Anita resides in Los Angeles with her partner John and a furry friend named Kunta.

Kristen Daniels studied creative writing at USC with T.C. Boyle and Aimee Bender, at UCLA Extension with Les Plesko, and at the Community of Writers at Squaw Valley. She lives in Encinitas, CA with her husband and two daughters.

Patricia Canright Smith is a writer and visual artist living in Edmonds, Washington. With advanced degrees in psychology and visual art, she practiced psychotherapy in Seattle while pursuing artistic interests. Her artwork has appeared in numerous group and solo shows in the Pacific Northwest. Patricia Smith also writes essays and short stories, which have been published in a variety of literary magazines. She has recently combined narrative and image to complete a book-length memoir, and has begun to collaborate with a jazz musician to create duets, prose, and piano.

Àkpà Árinzèchukwu is a 2023 Oxbelly Writing Retreat Fellow, a winner of the 2021 Poetry Archive Worldview Prize, a Best of the Net nominee, Pushcart, and Geoffrey Dearmer Prize, shortlisted for the FT/Bodley Head Prize, and a finalist for the 2020 Black Warrior Review Fiction Prize, his works appear in Kenyon Review, Adda, Transition, Black Warrior Review, Prairie Schooner, The Rumpus, Poetry Review, and elsewhere. He is the curator of Muqabalal, a bilingual conversation series, co-host of Muqabalal’s Poem a Day in Translation, and the Church of Poetry.

Kim Fay is the author of the national bestselling novel Love & Saffron; The Map of Los Memories, an Edgar-award finalist for best first novel; and the culinary memoir Communion: A Culinary Journey Through Vietnam.

Jamie Diamond’s stories have appeared in Ploughshares edited by Raymond Carver, Rita Dove, and Tess Gallagher. She earned the E.L. Doctorow fellowship and an MFA from New York University. She was awarded residencies at Yaddo, MacDowell, Sacatar, and Djerassi. She was the West Coast editor of Mademoiselle and has written for The New York Times, People, and Vogue. A recipient of a Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs grant, she conducted a theater project in Brazil. She edited a book, pro bono, about the Los Angeles unhoused that became a play whose staged benefit starred Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, and Alfre Woodard. She’s started a new novel, “And the Winner Is…” set in Hollywood.

Laura Burges, a lay-entrusted dharma teacher in the Soto Zen tradition, lectures and leads retreats at different practice centers in Northern California. Laura co-founded the Sangha in Recovery Program at San Francisco Zen Center and is the abiding teacher at Lenox House in Oakland. Her first book, Buddhist Stories for Kids, was published by Shambhala in December 2022 and Zen for Kids in March 2023. A book for adults, The Zen Way of Recovery was released in July 2023.

July - September 2024 Residents

Joshua Dysart is a New York Times bestselling writer of graphic novels and prose. His work often centers on real-world narratives backed by extensive research. He has traveled with child soldiers in Uganda (2007), convoyed across Iraqi Kurdistan interviewing Syrian refugees and victims of Da’esh (2014), and traveled across South Sudan researching human migration due to drought and war (2016). He has worked with the World Food Programme, Deepak Chopra, and musician Neil Young. In 2018 he led a college speaking tour across Pakistan for the “Comics for Peace” project. He has been published in seven languages, including Arabic.

JoBeth McDaniel is an author and journalist with work published in LIFE, AARPMagazine, House Beautiful, Veranda, Islands, Reader’s Digest, Newsweek and Business Week. She wrote for LIFE under five managing editors, operating LIFE’s LA bureau. She was a Working Woman columnist for four years, and Investors BusinessDaily columnist for three. Her bestselling biography A Special Kind of Hero (Doubleday, Dell) was named a Library Journal “Best Book” and a Literary Guild selection. JoBeth’s essays appear in several anthologies. Two were selected for college textbooks.

Sally J. Pla is an award-winning author of books for young people—although her work is popular with all ages. She’s known for writing contemporary “coming-of-age” fiction with honesty and heart, and for creating main characters who stay with you, long after you’ve turned the last page. Sally also runs A Novel Mind, a web resource on neurodiversity and mental health representation in children's lit. She, like many of her characters, is neurodivergent. Sally has English degrees from Colgate and Penn State and has worked as a journalist and in public education.

Sheryl Stradling is a mixed-media abstract artist and author. Stradling’s artistic work is eclectic, inspired by nature, architecture, cultural symbols, and Asian culture. She studied fine art at Western Washington University and printmaking at Pratt Fine Arts Center in Seattle, Washington. Her book, Faith, Power, Joy: Spiritual Guidance from 5 Generations of Remarkable Women, won the 2018 Body Mind Spirit book award for Spiritual Healing, and a Readers’ Favorite Five Star award. She also contributed to Journey of an Empath, a compilation of empath’s stories, and to Akasha: Spiritual Experiences of Accessing Our Soul’s Infinite Intelligence.

Molly Reid’s debut collection of stories, THE RAPTURE INDEX, won the seventh annual BOA Short Fiction Prize and was published by BOA Editions. The collection was longlisted for the Story Prize and the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection. Molly Reid’s stories have appeared in the journals Ninth Letter, West Branch, Witness, Mid-American Review, Crazyhorse, and Gulf Coast, among others. She received her Ph.D. in literature and creative writing from the University of Cincinnati, and she currently teaches creative writing at Portland State University and for Eastern Oregon University’s low-res MFA program. You can learn more at mollyjeanreid.com.

Michael Larkin’s short stories and essays have been published in literary journals such as Harvard Review, The Missouri Review, Natural Bridge, and Cimarron Review, among others; have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes; and have been featured as “Notable” in the Best American Nonrequired Reading and Best American Essays series. He teaches writing at the University of California, Berkeley.

Melody M. Nuñez is a mixed-media artist whose work combines vintage textiles, found objects, and embroidery. Her art, which is autobiographical in nature, explores universal themes. Ms. Nuñez processes her life experiences and translates them into a visual language. The artist is drawn to materials that are vintage, worn, and imperfect. Handmade vintage textiles are especially valued and are the foundations of her most recent body of work. Ms. Nuñez earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Studio Art from the University of California, Santa Barbara. She has participated in several juried exhibits and art shows, in both California and Kansas.

Emery Pearson is a writer living in southern California. She has an MA in rhetoric and composition from Boise State University and an MFA in creative writing from Antioch University. Her work has appeared in Assay, Punctuate, Jersey Devil Press, and elsewhere.

Zan Romanoff is the author of three young adult novels, most recently LOOK, which O: The Oprah Magazine called “one of the books that will change the LGBTQ+ literary landscape.” Her non-fiction has appeared in print and online in BuzzFeed, Eater, The Los Angeles Times, LitHub, The Paris Review and The Washington Post, among other outlets. She lives and writes in LA.

Patsy Phillips has collaborated for thirty years with artists, educators, scholars, and administrators who advocate for the advancement of contemporary Indigenous arts. She is in her sixteenth year as the Director of the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts (MoCNA). Before joining MoCNA, Phillips participated in the planning and opening of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian, Washington, D.C. in 2004. Phillips holds an MA in Writing from Johns Hopkins University, a Graduate Certificate in Museum Studies from Harvard University, and BA in Anthropology from Southern Methodist University. Phillips is an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma.

An author with three novels and two story collections, Victoria Patterson lives with her family in South Pasadena and teaches fiction at Antioch University’s Master of Fine Arts Program.

Brent Armendinger is the author of Street Gloss (The Operating System, 2019) and The Ghost in Us Was Multiplying (Noemi Press, 2015), both of which were finalists for the California Book Award in Poetry. Brent’s poems and translations have recently appeared in Anomaly, Asymptote, Bennington Review, Conjunctions Online, The Georgia Review, Ghost Proposal, Green Mountain Review, Interim, Provincetown Arts, and Tinfish. He has been awarded residencies and fellowships at Willapa Bay AIR, Mineral School, Blue Mountain Center, Headlands Center for the Arts, and the Community of Writers. Brent teaches creative writing at Pitzer College and lives in Los Angeles.

Danielle Ezzo is an interdisciplinary artist and writer. Danielle’s work has been published in the Boston Globe, The New York Times, and The Tate and exhibited in numerous exhibitions and festivals including the A.C. Institute and the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. She’s lectured at conferences, companies, and schools about the future of photography. Bylines include The New Inquiry, Magnum Photos, Right Click Save, Fellowship Trust, and Obscura Journal. She is the author of If Not Here, The Where? published by Silent Face Projects in 2023. Danielle graduated from Lesley University in 2015 with an MFA in Photography and Integrated Media.

Sherri C. Perry is the author of Venn, a collection of short stories, Letters to Cadence, Musings of a Modern Grandmother and Slice, a collection of poetry. Her work has been featured in Streetlight Magazine, Tigershark Publishing, GNU Literary Journal, Dragon Poet Review, The Bayou Review, Emerge Magazine and The Storyteller Magazine. Her awards include the Write Partners of North Arkansas Award, Ozark Creative Writers Editor’s Award, Clouse Literary Arts and Theater Award, Saturday Writers Creative Non-Fiction Award, Porter Art Enterprises Award and The Caudle Memorial Award for Excellence in Storytelling. She is the head speech and debate coach at an all-girls college preparatory high school in Houston, Texas.

Edan Lepucki is the New York Times bestselling author of the novels California and Woman No. 17, and the editor of Mothers Before: Stories and Portraits of our Mothers as We Never Saw Them. Her nonfiction has been published in the New York Times Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, Romper, The Cut, and Esquire Magazine, among other publications. Her story "People in Hell Want Ice Water" was released as an Audible Original, and her novel Time's Mouth is forthcoming.

Judy Reeves is an award-winning writer and teacher who has published four books on the craft including "A Writer’s Book of Days" and "Wild Women, Wild Voices," and a memoir, "When Your Heart Says Go." She previously taught at UCSD Extension and has led community-based writing practice groups for thirty years. She is on the faculty of the Southern California Writers’ Conference, teaches at writing conferences internationally, and at San Diego Writers, Ink, a nonprofit literary center she cofounded.

October - December 2024 Residents

Colleen James is a painter and mixed media artist focused on the abstracted natural world and imagined landscapes. Her work is highly influenced by the colors and patterns found in mid-century textiles and her 15+ year career working for the modern furniture company Knoll. She has a degree in Fine Arts from Georgetown University and has studied painting and drawing at the University of Paris and the Art Students League in New York. She also has an MBA from Stanford University. Colleen shows her work through Studio Montclair in Montclair, NJ, and the Drawing Galaxy.

Rita Kasperek's short fiction has won several short story contests and appeared in The Portland Review, Storyglossia, Word Riot, Terrain, Yankee Pot Roast, The Georgia Review, The Sand Hill Review, River Styx, Big Ugly Review, New York Stories, and other publications. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Arizona and studied at the Community of Writers and Summer Literary Seminars. She has two novels in the works.

Daniel Getzoff is a Los Angeles-based community activist and organizer, a playwright, personal essayist, blogger, performer, and multi-faceted nonprofit sector worker. His first published story will appear in the upcoming 42 Stories Anthology Presents: Book of 42. Danny was awarded 2 residencies at Playa Summerlake in south-central Oregon to work on his first novel, Nicknames for Harold, the manuscript of which is nearly complete. He has published 80+ essays about his 3 solo cross-country bicycle trips at http://handlebarconfessional.blogspot.com and https://handlebarconfessional.com, which will be the subject of his upcoming memoir, Handlebar Confessional.Type your paragraph here.

Zachary Zezima is director based in Los Angeles. His most recent short film, Friend of a Friend, premiered at Annecy in 2020 and has also screened at film festivals such as Slamdance, Stuttgart, and Guanajuato. It was nominated for a UniFrance Short Film Award, won the Special Jury Award at the Anilogue International Animation Festival, and Best International Short Animated Film at the Oscar/BAFTA-qualifying Go Short International Short Film Festival. Shifting into documentaries, in 2021 he directed animation for an episode of PRIDE; a six-part docuseries on FX/Hulu detailing LGBTQ+ civil rights throughout six distinct decades.

Straddling both film & theater, TrishDenton is a multidisciplinary director, producer, and storyteller specializing in immersive work. Producing in a variety of mediums, her visions often conjure the fantastic & surreal. She is the founder and Producing Artistic Director of In Tandem Arts, a nonprofit organization that produces immersive theater and multimedia experiences. Most recently, Trish produced & directed Retro Spec starring Kat Wright, the 4-screen video fantasia X-VOTIVE featuring Acqua Mossa, and the musical dreamscape “Easy on Me” featuring Marcie Hernandez. Both X-VOTIVE and Easy On Me have won laurels in international film festivals within the last year.

Natalie Sudman is an artist and writer, with an interest in the spirit of place, consciousness, and the nature of being. She is the author of Application of Impossible Things: Out of Body in Iraq, and her poetry and essays have been published nationally and abroad. She earned her MFA in ceramic arts at the University of Oregon. She now works primarily with collage and abstract oil on yupo, and her artwork has been exhibited internationally.

Patti Jazanoski’s writing has appeared in Cimarron Review, Kenyon Review Online, Ploughshares Blog, Confrontation, The Rumpus, The San Francisco Chronicle, Catamaran Literary Reader, and elsewhere. She’s been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, the Best of the Net Anthology, and was awarded the Doug Fortier MCWC Short Fiction Scholarship. A member of the Authors Guild and National Book Critics Circle, Patti earned an M.F.A. in Creative Writing and Literature from the Bennington Writing Seminars and degrees from the University of California Santa Cruz and the University of Michigan. She’s currently at work on a collection of short stories and a novel.

Fanen Chiahemen is an author and journalist. Her writing has appeared in The Montreal Gazette, The Washington Post, American Journalism Review, The George Street Carnival, and the bilingual arts magazine La Scena Musicale. Since 2011 she has served first as Editor, then Editor-in-Chief of Canadian Cinematographer magazine where she has interviewed such artists as Atom Egoyan, Paul Sarossy, Jean-Marc Vallée, and Academy Award-winner Sarah Polley. Her first book, Never Make A Sound (The Awakened Press, 2021), was shortlisted for the VMI Betsy Warland Between Genres Award and was an Amazon Top-100 book. She is a global nomad who has lived in nine countries and travelled to many more.

Aleta Barthell is a producer and writer. She is wrapping up production on a documentary—The Mosleys: Love for the Ages. During her time at Dorland, Aleta will develop a play called My Own Wilderness that explores the fantastical life of a woman experiencing dementia. This project has been funded by the William Male Foundation.

Aleta holds a Bachelor in Science from Northwestern University, trained as an actor at the British American Drama Academy, Shakespeare & Company, and has studied playwriting/screenwriting at the Kennedy Center, The Dramatists Guild Institute, and UCSD.

Gretchen DeVault is a dynamic multidisciplinary artist, renowned for her versatility as a songwriter, musician, producer, and graphic designer. Her prolific catalog of songwriting and recorded music has garnered both critical acclaim and commercial recognition and has been featured in Target and Motorola commercials along with several independent films and podcasts. Parallel to her musical endeavors, she has carved out a significant niche in graphic design, she has built a career in graphic design, displaying her extensive artistic abilities. DeVault's work embodies the essence of artistry, where music and design converge to express her profound creative vision.

Erin Swan is the author of Walk the Vanished Earth (Viking, 2022), a speculative novel spanning two hundred years, seven generations, and two planets. Her work has appeared in Literary Hub, Tor, Fourth Genre, South Carolina Review, Portland Review, and elsewhere. A graduate of the MFA program at The New School and Teachers College at Columbia University, she lives in Brooklyn and teaches English at a public high school in lower Manhattan.

Kara Laurene Pernicano Kara Laurene Pernicano (they/she) is an artist and poet. Through hybrid image-text arts, K Laurene seeks to awaken an interpersonal approach to trauma, grief, talk therapy, and mental wellness. Kara is pursuing their PhD in Gender Studies at Stony Brook University. She has an MFA from Queens College and an MA from the University of Cincinnati. Her work has appeared in Snapdragon, Waccamaw, The Humanities in Transition, Full Stop, the Winnow magazine, ang(st), Passengers Journal, Newtown Literary, Madwomen in the Attic, The Stardust Review, the Whitney Staff Art Show, LIC Artists’ Plaxall Gallery and King Manor Museum.

Raven Miller works in a variety of artistic mediums, including video, photography, sculpture, painting, and book arts. His works have been shown in a variety of venues in Minneapolis and Saint Paul including Vine Arts Center, Augsburg University, Minnesota Center for Book Arts, and the Gordon Parks and Cargill galleries. Miller has created videos for Eagle Heart Productions, Raven Studios, Project Footsteps, Northern Spark and has screened his Queer films at Minneapolis/St. Paul International Film Festival, the European Short Film Festival, the Roma Independent Prisma Awards, and the LGBTQ Unbordered International Film Festival and other festivals across Europe.

Mia Alvar is the author of IN THE COUNTRY, which won the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize, the Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize, and the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Award. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, One Story, The Missouri Review, the Cincinnati Review, and elsewhere. Mia has been a writer in residence at Yaddo, the Djerassi Resident Artists Program, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and the Blue Mountain Center for the Arts. She teaches in the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers.

Sherilyn Lee earned her Master of Fine Arts degree in Creative Nonfiction from Antioch University Los Angeles. She posts daily #overheards to her popular Instagram channel (@sherilynwrites) where she also writes about being a family caregiver. Her writing has appeared in Brevity, Common Ground Review, and other journals. She has been a Juried Poet for the Houston Poetry Fest, a finalist in the National Poetry Series Open Competition, and a semi-finalist for the Philip Levine Prize in Poetry. She is the founding Poetry Editor for Flight Literary West. Sherilyn lives in Southern California where she referees for the Los Angeles Derby Dolls.

Ruby Peru's 2017 novel Bits of String Too Small to Save was named Distinguished Favorite by the New York Big Book Award. In the same year, Kirkus Reviews named her an "Indie Author to Watch." Her detective novel Untamed Justice, co-written with retired homicide chief Herman Hinton, has received critical acclaim as well. Ruby also ghostwrites memoirs and nonfiction for thought leaders, scientists, titans of business, cult escapees and others with compelling life stories.

Kathryn Jordan is from Berkeley, CA. In the past year, her poems placed or won Honorable Mention in The Steve Kowit, Muriel Craft Bailey, Connecticut River Poetry Award, and Patricia Dobler poetry contests. Kathryn’s work appears in Catamaran, Atlanta Review, The Sun, Comstock Review, and New Ohio Review, among others. She is a bird nerd and loves nothing better than to hike the East Bay Hills in search of the Swainson’s Thrush.

John Wuchte has been an actor/writer/director/theater creator for more 35 years. He started his acting career in NYC in the 80s and wrote and directed his first play Vivian Vance is Alive and Well in '91. He was Artisitc Director of RAKKA-THAMM!!! theater for 10 years, notable for adapting/staging Greek tragedies outside in Washington Square park. Moving to Los Angeles in 2000 he has been part of Sacred Fools Theater for 20 years. Last year he created Scarlett Fever, a physical theater movement piece that was the hit of the Hollywood Fringe festival. His latest work Housewife 1952 was derailed due to pandemic.

Theresa Keegan is an award-winning writer. An accomplished journalist she has published numerous stories, essays, and commentaries both in print and online. Her writing has appeared in local, state, and national publications. Her latest work includes short stories and fiction. The California-based author is a proud board member of Third Street Writers in Laguna Beach, where she initiated and edited the award-winning Art Inscribed book series in conjunction with the Pageant of the Masters. When not behind a computer or talking to her fictional characters she can be found happily paddling on the Pacific Ocean in an outrigger canoe.

Sooltan Madsen (b. Sun Valley, Idaho) received a B.F.A. in painting from The Savannah College of Art and Design, Savannah, GA in 2022. She has exhibited her work in solo and group exhibitions across the United States including galleries in Savannah, Chicago, Laguna Beach, Long Island, and San Diego. Madsen makes colorful portraits surrounding LGBT and Western identity. Her most recent exhibitions that ran simultaneously were, Proud to Be Seen in Tubac, AZ, SCAD Painting Senior Showcase in Savannah, GA, and Proud+ in San Diego, CA. She currently lives and works in Minneapolis, MN.

Kristine L. Schomaker is an Art Historian, Curator, Publisher, Art Manager, and multidisciplinary artist living and working at the Brewery artist complex in Los Angeles, California. She earned her BA in Art History and MA in Studio Art from California State University at Northridge. Kristine’s art practice includes painting, photography, drawing, sculpture, performance, and conceptual art based focused on body image and society’s perception of beauty. In 2014 Kristine founded Shoebox Arts to support and empower artists while building community and creating new opportunities. Kristine is also the publisher of Art and Cake, a contemporary L.A. Art magazine.

Emily Jira is an author and actress. She is currently working on a young adult novel that weaves together her family lore with her Thai heritage, with just a touch of horror. She graduated with a BFA in Theater from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts and has studied creative writing through the UCLA Extension Writers’ Program. She is based in Los Angeles.

Dare DeLano’s debut novel Abilene, (forthcoming from Mint Hill Books), is both a coming-of-age story (featuring dark clouds, whispered spells, and a search for a father), and a love story (featuring 80’s new wave club culture, occasional psychedelic trips, and Heideggerian philosophy.) An earlier draft of Abilene was short-listed as a finalist for the Faulkner-Wisdom Creative Writing Competition. Dare’s children’s book Odus and the Long Way Home won the San Diego Book Award in 2015, and also the Gold Moonbeam Children’s Book Award. Dare received her MFA in creative writing from Fairfield University in 2020. She is represented by Jennifer Thompson of Nordlyset Literary Agency.

Mailing address: P.O. Box 6, Temecula, CA 92593 ~ Physical Address: 36701 Highway 79 South, Temecula, CA 92592
(951) 302-3837 ~ www.dorlandartscolony.org ~ info@dorlandartscolony.org
A California 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization

Laila Freeman is an award-winning journalist and Best of the Net nominated creative writer. She received her bachelor’s in journalism from CSULB and is currently attending Chapman University’s MFA program. Freeman has over 40 publications in various media outlets like Long Beach Local News and Signal Tribune. In 2023, Freeman interviewed NBA Laker Champion Pau Gasol about his children’s health foundation. Freeman’s poetry has been featured in publications such as Samfiftyfour Magazine and OyeDrum Magazine. She likes to say, “poetry is my alchemy, journalism is my science.” Freeman is currently writing a fantasy children’s novel.

Wicki is a painter whose favored medium is oil paint. She also works occasionally in encaustic, water color and gouache. Her subjects are drawn from her homes (Kaua'i and Southern California) and travels in Nepal and Tibet. Plants, animals and people appear in her work to share the message that we are connected in many ways and share life, really, as one. Returning to Dorland will be a welcome renewal of her connection with a place she loves and which never fails to inspire her to create.

Fiona Lindsay Shen is an art historian and writer. She is the author of Pearl: Nature’s Perfect Gem (Reaktion Books, 2022), Silver (Reaktion Books, 2017), and Knowledge is Pleasure: Florence Ayscough in Shanghai (Hong Kong University Press, 2012). Her writing has appeared in Orion, the Washington Post, China Today, the Cimarron Review, and many other publications. She was born in Wales, grew up in Scotland, and spent her adult life in Shanghai and rural China, Britain, and the United States. She has a Ph.D. in Art History from the University of St. Andrews, Scotland, and has taught at the University of Wales, Minneapolis College of Art and Design, the University of Minnesota, Sino-British College, Shanghai, and Chapman University, Orange, CA.

Maile Black writes short stories and a novel-in-progress about fully fledged women who think, artists who try to escape themselves, pretenders who thrive in worlds of their own making. With years of professional editing experience under her belt, Black coaches writers in a private practice and as a visiting lecturer at Salem State University. Her indie publishing company, Winter Island Press (winterislandpress.com), is named for her home on the watery edge of Salem, Massachusetts, where she and her husband live according to the tides.

Suzie V. Freeman has been a sitcom writer for the past 25 years. Her work spans from family-friendly Disney and Nickelodeon shows to prime time sitcoms and even edgy action comedies. Suzie and her writing partner, Sarah Jane Cunningham like to joke that they are two time Emmy losers, but they are very proud of their nominations. After enduring a few years of Pandemic Zoom writers rooms followed by the double Writers Guild/SAG strike, Suzie decided to use the time to write memoir.

RESIDENTS: 2024

Kate Brody is a novelist, living in Los Angeles. Her debut RABBIT HOLE is forthcoming from Soho Press (Jan 2024), and she has published shorter work in Lit Hub, The Literary Review, and Write or Die, among other magazines. She has an MFA from NYU.

Taylor Gallegos is a painter specializing in large-scale murals, paintings on canvas, and live art. In general, his work focuses on unity, environmentalism, connection, love, and creativity. As a professional artist, his work has ranged from large-scale murals to portraits to abstracts in the studio to live art, mostly in the fields of painting and drawing with acrylics and oils.