2016 Rome Prize Information Session:

• Mark Robbins, 1997 Fellow, President and CEO
• Yolande Daniels, 2004 Fellow
• Richard Olcott, 2004 Fellow

The American Academy in Rome, in conjunction with the Architectural League of New York, invites you to an information session on the Rome Prize Fellowships in Architecture, Design, Landscape Architecture and Historic Preservation and Conservation. Mark Robbins, President and CEO, will give a presentation on the prize and the Academy, and past winners Yolande Daniels and Richard Olcott will discuss their time in Rome. A short Q&A will follow.

Yolande Daniels, a founding design principal of Studio SUMO, won the Rome Prize in 2003. Daniels worked on her proposal "invisible technologies: Roman Walls," a study of the socio-political forces behind the morphology of the Aurelian wall, in tandem with "black city2: the miscegenation game," an installation on segregation and gentrification that was in the Harlemworld exhibition at the Studio Museum. Both projects dealt with the impulses of domination and colonization. The methodology used in the two projects informed each other; however, the project approaches differed: the specificity of the construction of the wall led invisible technologies; while demographic and geographical data led "black city2."

Richard Olcott, a founding partner and Design Principal at Ennead Architects, also won the Rome Prize in 2003. Olcott's proposal, "Hybrid Buildings and the Urban Continuum," set out to study and analyze the "hybrid buildings" of Rome, or structures that over time had been extensively added to or transformed; his proposal then went on to consider a contemporary intervention of his own design. Through the study of these buildings, Olcott developed an analysis methodology involving digital photography, freehand sketching, watercolor drawings in plan and section, and models to represent each project. Particularly important was the attempt to simultaneously represent the different successive interventions on a site whether they remained or not, so as to see how they influenced each other.

The American Academy in Rome supports innovative artists, writers, and scholars living and working together in a dynamic international community. Founded in 1894, the Academy is the oldest American overseas center for independent study and advanced research in the arts and humanities. A not-for-profit, privately funded institution, the Academy awards the Rome Prize to thirty emerging artists and scholars who represent the highest standard of excellence and who are in the early or middle stages of their working lives. The winners are invited to Rome to pursue their work in an atmosphere conducive to intellectual and artistic experimentation and interdisciplinary exchange. The Rome Prize consists of room and board, a stipend ($28,000 for 11-month fellowships; $16,000 for six-month fellowships) and separate work space, and privileged access to Rome. Rome Prize winners are the core of the Academy's residential community, which also includes Affiliated Fellows, Residents and Visiting Artists and Visiting Scholars.

The deadline for the nation-wide Rome Prize competition is Sunday, November 1, 2015. Applications will also be accepted between November 2-15, 2015 for an additional fee.

More information on the Rome Prize and the online application can be found here.

The information session is free and open to all. Reservations are suggested, but not required.