Full-term and half-term Rome Prize Fellowships are available in visual arts. Applicants must demonstrate at least three years of professional commitment and currently be engaged in the discipline. Applicants working in art and technology are also encouraged to apply.

Included in visual arts: painting, sculpture, drawing, photography, film/video, installation, new media, digital arts, and other visual arts–related fields.

A completed online application form and the following two documents, to be uploaded to your online application as two separate digital files.

1. Current résumé/curriculum vitae

2. One-page proposal describing the project to be undertaken. Please be sure to address the following points/questions in your proposal:

• How will the proposed project and your own professional development will benefit from a residency within a multidisciplinary community in Rome?
• What guides or motivates your work?
• Rome is a modern city powerfully stamped by the material remains of the past. Is this past important to your present? If so, why?
• What, if any, resources in Rome or Italy will be significant to the completion of your proposed project?
• What kind of workspace do you need in Rome?

Your proposal should be double-spaced with 10- to 12-point typeface and one-inch margins.

3. Work sample(s): digital images and/or video. See the Work Sample Specifications below.

Also needed are three references. Provide the names and contact information only for three professionals acquainted with you and your work. Letters of recommendation are not required for applicants in visual arts.

Finally, you must submit an application fee paid by credit card through our online payment option or by check or money order made payable to American Academy in Rome. Send to the address below.

Work Sample Specifications for Digital Images

A maximum of eighteen digital JPEG images may be uploaded with the application. Images will be shown two at a time, side by side. In the initial screening, jurors view only the first six images.

Formatting your digital images:

• Images must be in JPEG format with .jpg extension
• The longest side (height and/or width) of each image should be a minimum of 1240 pixels
• The maximum size for each image file is 10 MB

Work Sample Specifications for Video

Video work samples will be accepted from applicants who are submitting time-based work such as film, video, performance art, new media, kinetic sculpture, installation, etc. Do not submit a video of still images, slideshows, or videos of you at work. Applicants submitting video are not required to submit digital images.

Submit up to three samples totaling no more than ten minutes in length. Choose one of the following:

• One sample totaling no more than ten minutes; or
• A selection of excerpts from one work edited together and totaling no more than ten minutes, or
• Up to three separate samples from different works, totaling no more than ten minutes

If your samples are available online (videos must be public and not password protected), please enter the URLs in the fields provided in the application form. Otherwise, please send video samples on a USB drive to: 

American Academy in Rome
Attention: Visual Arts
535 West 22nd Street, 3rd Floor
New York, NY 10011

This fall, the American Academy in Rome will host two in-person information sessions about the Rome Prize. The first takes place at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia on Tuesday, September 24. The second will be presented at the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence on Tuesday, October 8. 

AAR will also present two general online information sessions on Zoom on September 23 and October 15. A third virtual meeting, focused only on landscape architecture, will happen on October 16.

These information sessions give prospective applicants a general overview of the Rome Prize application process, tips on what makes a successful application, and a look into the experience of living in the American Academy’s unique residential community in Rome.