Assistant Professor of Architecture Ashley Bigham has been awarded a MacDowell Residency during the spring of 2021. The MacDowell is a leading contemporary arts organization located in Peterborough, New Hampshire that brings multidisciplinary artists together to exchange ideas and pursue creative work. COVID modifications and testing will allow participants to conduct residency work on-site.       

At MacDowell, Bigham will work on the forthcoming publication Fulfilled: Architecture, Excess, and Desire. The book is based on the eponymous symposium at the Knowlton School in February 2020 which gathered architects to discuss and share work on the topics of logistical, material, and cultural fulfillment. This publication will include work and essays from a diverse group of architects in addition to work from the Fulfilled exhibition which coincided with the symposium in the Banvard Gallery.

As a symposium and exhibition, Fulfilled considered the role of architecture in a culture shaped by the excessive manufacture and assuagement of desire. The event examined architecture through three main themes of fulfillment: material, logistical, and cultural. The symposium drew out the new arrangements, sticky relationships, and material byproducts of cultural production in the age of fulfillment, and asked once again the age-old question, “What does it mean to be fulfilled?”

Since 1907, the MacDowell has provided essential support for emerging and established artists in the disciplines of architecture, film/video arts, interdisciplinary arts, literature, music composition, theatre, and visual arts. About 300 artists, selected by a panel comprised of a revolving group of distinguished professionals in each artistic discipline, are awarded fellowships each year and the sole criterion for acceptance is artistic excellence, according to the MacDowell mission statement.