DETROIT, MI.- The Kresge Foundation awarded the inaugural Kresge Artist Fellowships, each with an unrestricted stipend of $25,000, to 18 metropolitan Detroit visual artists. The Fellowships are the first of its kind to be devoted exclusively to artists in the Detroit area and represent the foundation’s unwavering support for artists living and working in its hometown. Detroit’s College for Creative Studies administers the fellowships. Fellows are also offered customized professional development opportunities provided by ArtServe Michigan.

The 2009 Kresge Artist Fellows in the Visual Arts are:
Shiva Ahmadi
Hartmut Austen
Lynne Avadenka
Kristin Beaver
Ed Fraga
Susan Goethel Campbell
Tyree Guyton
Chido Johnson
Rod Klingelhofer
Abigail Anne Newbold
Gordon Newton
Russ Orlando
Senghor Reid
Michael Edward Smith
Gilda Snowden
Cedric Tai
Sioux Trujillo
Corine Vermeulen-Smith

The 2009 Kresge Artist Fellowship Panel that selected the fellows includes: Susan Bandes, Director of Kresge Art Museum at Michigan State University, Lansing, MI; Aaron Betsky, Director of the Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, OH; Dick Goody, Director of the Oakland University Art Gallery, Rochester, MI; Lorna Simpson, Artist, Brooklyn, NY; and Richard Tuttle, Artist, New York, NY and Abiquiu, NM.

The fellowships, along with an annual Kresge Eminent Artist Award and multi-year operating support grants to arts and cultural organizations, constitute Kresge Arts in Detroit, the foundation’s effort to provide broad support to the regional arts community. Kresge Arts in Detroit is one facet of the foundation’s Detroit Program, a comprehensive, five-part community-development effort to strengthen the long-term economic, social and cultural fabric of the city and surrounding area by strengthening Detroit’s neighborhoods and downtown, promoting arts and culture, advancing regional economic development, and enhancing the natural environment.

“Individual artists are the life-blood of any highly creative, highly energized community,” says Rip Rapson, president of the Kresge Foundation. “We are proud to support 18 of the Detroit area’s most talented and imaginative individuals and hope, for each of them, that the fellowships will serve as a catalyst for a productive and rewarding year.”