Where Are They Now? Checking In With Former VisArts Residents

The Visual Arts Center of Richmond offers a range of residency programs to support artists and makers at all stages of their careers. Residents have the opportunity to expand their practice, try new media, and create new work through free studio access, demos, and skillshares. VisArts’ Studio Access Residencies and Annual Residencies also culminate in an exhibition of artist work in the True F. Luck Gallery.

We are profoundly grateful and proud to say that many residents remain active members of the VisArts community, returning to take or teach classes, attend exhibition openings, throw bowls to donate to the Chili Throwdown, or exhibit in Craft + Design.

But of course, these artists also go on to do incredible things outside of VisArts’ walls. We reached out to past residents to check in and catch up on the exciting things they’ve accomplished since the conclusion of their residency.

Kimberly English

kimberly-english.com | @kimberly__english
2024 VisArts Studio Access Resident

Kimberly English’s (she/her) fiber-based practice explores the connection between individual agency and collective experience through historical, personal, and perceptual interrogations of textile structure. Her woven and sewn forms synthesize narratives informed by the American South and globalized labor, investigating the nuance of interdependence between land, machines, people, and the objects they create.

Kimberly was the ’24-‘25 Emerging Artist Fellow in Fiber at Virginia Commonwealth University and runs a weaving residency, Tabby Studio, out of the shared studio space on her property in Canton, North Carolina.

What Kimberly’s Been Up To

Grants, Awards, + Residencies:

2026
Early Career Artist Tools & Equipment Grant, American Craft Council
Artist in Residence, McColl Center, Charlotte NC

2025
Visiting Artist, The Gibbes Museum, Charleston SC
CERF+ Get Ready Grant, Craft Emergency Relief Fund
Artist Fellow, VCCA, Amherst VA
Artist in Residence, Berea College, Berea KY
WNC Craft Futures Grant + Cohort, Center for Craft, Asheville NC
Artist Support Grant, North Carolina Arts Council

Selected solo exhibitions:

2027
Southern Gothic, The Gibbes Museum, Charleston SC (upcoming)

2026
Figure / Ground, Rutledge Gallery, Winthrop University, Rock Hill SC (upcoming)
Counterweight, Arcadia, Charlotte NC
Yield, Whitney Center for the Arts, Sheridan College, Sheridan WY

2025
Where The Line Falls Slack, Appalachian Center for Craft at Tennessee Tech, Cookeville TN

Selected group exhibitions:

2026
Warp, Weft, and the Grid, Asheville Art Museum, Asheville NC (upcoming)
Process as Practice, North Carolina Museum of Art, Winston-Salem, Winston Salem NC (upcoming)
With A Southern Accent, Cameron Art Museum, Wilmington NC (upcoming)
The New Weaving: Contemporary Cloth Culture in Appalachia and Beyond, Madison Co. Arts Council, Marshall NC (upcoming), Curated by Amber Jensen

2025
Thrown Over Small Shoulders, Warbling Collective, London UK
Layered, Woven, and Pierced: Appalachian Soul A Year On, Tipton-Ashe Gallery, Johnson City TN
True Blue, LIGHT Art + Design, Chapel Hill NC
Unboxed: Rethinking the Grid, Brick City Gallery, Missouri State University, Springfield MO
FIBRATION III: Anxiety + Hope, L’Space Gallery, New York NY
Intersections & Diversions, Chautauqua Institution, Chautauqua, NY

Sarah K. Patro

makeforgood.com | @makeforgood
2024 VisArts Studio Access Resident

Sarah K. Patro is a printmaker drawn to slow living and careful detail, creating artwork inspired by places that offer calm, retreat, and a pause from the pace of everyday life. Her work begins with observation and attention, shaped by time spent in peaceful environments and by the rhythms of daily life.

Patro is an artist, mother, and wife, working from her sunroom studio in Richmond, Virginia. Each original print is carved by hand and printed one at a time, allowing the process to remain visible and present in the final work.

Patro is drawn to traditional printmaking for its quiet discipline and its connection to generations of makers who worked patiently, creating work meant to endure over time. She believes the spaces we inhabit matter, and that artwork can help create moments of retreat within homes and shared spaces.

What Sarah’s Been Up To

“Since my residency, I’ve released two linocut collections (“Sanctuary” and “On The Water”) and one ceramics collection, each focused on peaceful interactions between the natural and human-made; places of solitude and restful retreat.

I’ve also had my work featured in Uppercase Magazine and licensed by Michael Roger’s Decomposition Book brand. One of the notebook designs (Fireflies) was released this summer, and I’ve got two more on their way in Fall and Winter 2026/2027.

I was recently accepted into the Cuttyhunk Island Artists’ Residency in Massachusetts to spend quiet time on the island and create new linocut work this September.

I’m so grateful to the VisArts community for believing in my work and giving me space to explore it more, especially because I’m an artist who came to this work later in life. My studio access residency gave me the experience and confidence to continue growing and experimenting. It was an honor and a privilege to test new creative ideas in your beautiful studio spaces last year!”

Amy Hill Hyman

@a.hillhyman
2022 VisArts Studio Access Resident

Amy Hill Hyman (they/them) is a painter from Moncks Corner, SC. They received their BFA from the College of Charleston in 2019 and are currently based in Richmond, VA.

Hill Hyman’s paintings use recollected, found, and observational imagery to retroactively illustrate domestic spaces inspired by their Lowcountry upbringing. Their recent works address with tenderness the tension between alienation and innate desires of belonging through skewed perspectives, and implied, but unseen, occupation. The works serving as a way to safely recapture, examine, and preserve these past impressions when tokens and places have been lost to physical and emotional distance, or simply lost to time.

What Amy’s Been Up To

Their works have been included in group shows at The Painting Center (New York, NY), Deep Space Gallery (Jersey Citer, NJ), SP Gallery (Amelia Court House, VA), and ArtFields Southern Art Competition (Lake City, SC).

Hill Hyman will be included in a two person show at Foyer Gallery (Richmond, VA) in 2027.

 

Courtney Lebow

thatcoolartteacher.com | @that.cool.art.teacher
2025 VisArts Studio Access Resident

For Courtney Lebow (she/her), teaching and utilizing her love for the visual arts as a vehicle for human connection is her ultimate professional goal and passion. For the last decade, she has been working in the field of art education. She taught high school art full-time for six years at Hanover High School, leading the art department and leaving a legacy of 6 murals and a thriving art program. She received a Masters in Art Education from Virginia Commonwealth University in December 2018, and plans to begin her Masters of Fine Arts Studies at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) in the summer of 2026.

What Courtney’s Been Up To

“Since my studio access residency, I have been selected to be the next Creative-in-Residence at The Children’s Museum of Richmond. I am currently painting a 38-foot mural at their Chesterfield location and leading creative workshops to youth there as well. My mural is going to be very whimsical—a maximalist color bonanza with sequins and glitter. Think Starry Night meets Lisa Frank! Check out my social media for updates as it unfolds!

I am starting a new position this coming September with a wonderful High School called Lynnhaven, located in Henrico. I am building a new art program there from the ground up, and I’m so excited to be back in the classroom this Fall.”

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Learn more about VisArts’ artist residencies, including our current artists-in-residence, at visarts.org/artist-residencies.

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Interests and opinions expressed by artists-in-residence are their own. Learn more about VisArts’ organizational values and code of conduct.