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Reflecting on My Artist Residency at the Ely Center of Contemporary Art

Shilo Ratner, artist, discussing color theory during her residency at the Ely Whitney Contemporary Center in New Haven, CT.

In fall 2017, I received news that stopped me mid-brushstroke: I had been selected for a three-month artist residency at the Ely Center of Contemporary Art (ECOCA) in New Haven, Connecticut. A dedicated studio. Three uninterrupted months. The freedom to create without a single obligation pulling me away from the work. I remember thinking: this is exactly what I've been waiting for.

Nine years later, I still think about what those three months taught me.

About the Ely Center of Contemporary Art (ECOCA)

The Ely Center of Contemporary Art is a New Haven–based nonprofit arts organization dedicated to supporting contemporary artists through exhibitions, residencies, and community programming. ECOCA provides artists with the time, space, and resources to develop ambitious new work — making it one of Connecticut's most respected platforms for emerging and mid-career artists working across disciplines. Being chosen felt like a genuine vote of confidence in the direction my work was heading.

Walking Into the Studio for the First Time

There's something about walking into a studio space that belongs entirely to you — even temporarily — that shifts something in your chest. The light was good. The walls were bare and waiting. I set down my materials and stood there for a moment, just taking it in. Three months felt both impossibly long and not nearly enough.

What the residency gave me:

  • A private studio space dedicated exclusively to art-making for three months
  • Open-ended creative freedom with no prescribed outcomes
  • A community of fellow artists in residence to think alongside
  • The physical and mental space to work at a larger scale than my usual practice allowed
  • Deep immersion in New Haven's vibrant contemporary art community

The Work: Larger Scale, Deeper Focus

I'd always wanted to work bigger. Not just in size — though that too — but in ambition. There are limits that accumulate quietly in any studio practice: limits of time, of mental bandwidth, of the invisible pressure to produce rather than explore. At ECOCA, those limits fell away. I started pulling out larger sheets of paper, mixing bolder color, letting compositions breathe in ways they never had before.

The geometric abstract work I made that fall felt different. More confident. More willing to take up space. I'd arrive in the morning with an idea and follow it wherever it led — sometimes into something unexpected, sometimes into something I'd been circling for years without knowing it. That fall became one of the most productive and clarifying seasons of my practice — and looking back now, I can trace a direct line from the work I made at ECOCA to the paintings I create today. The ECOCA residency is part of a longer exhibition history you can explore on my gallery exhibitions page.

The Community of Artists

What I didn't anticipate was how much the other artists in residence would shape the experience. We'd pass each other in the hallways, stop to look at each other's work, talk about what we were chasing and what was eluding us. There's a particular kind of conversation that only happens between artists deep in the middle of making — honest, specific, generous. Those conversations stayed with me long after the residency ended. They still do.

What I Know Now That I Didn't Know Then

Reflecting on it nine years later, I understand the residency differently than I did at the time. In the moment, it felt like an opportunity. In hindsight, it was a turning point. The permission to prioritize the work completely — to follow an idea past the point where daily life would have interrupted it, to fail and try again without the pressure of an immediate outcome — that's not something you can manufacture. You have to be given it. ECOCA gave it to me, and I've been trying to honor that gift in every painting since.

If you're an artist considering applying for a residency: do it. The work you make in that kind of space will surprise you.

Why Artist Residencies Matter

Artist residencies are among the most powerful accelerators of creative development available to working artists. By removing the friction of everyday obligations and providing dedicated time and space, residencies create the conditions for risk-taking, experimentation, and growth that are difficult to achieve in a standard studio practice. For geometric abstract artists, residencies offer the opportunity to work at scale — to engage with larger formats, new materials, and more ambitious compositions.

How to Apply for an Artist Residency in Connecticut

If you're researching how to apply for an artist residency in Connecticut, the Ely Center of Contemporary Art is one of the most respected programs in the region. ECOCA welcomes applications from emerging and mid-career artists working across disciplines — painting, mixed media, sculpture, and beyond. I'd encourage any artist serious about developing their practice to explore what they offer. Visit the ECOCA website for current residency opportunities, application requirements, and deadlines. It's worth every minute of the application process.

New Haven: A Hub for Contemporary Art

New Haven has always felt like home to me as an artist. It's a city that takes art seriously — shaped by Yale's renowned programs, the Yale Center for British Art, the Yale University Art Gallery, and organizations like ECOCA that exist specifically to support working artists. Yale's legacy in color theory runs deep here too — Josef Albers taught at Yale, and that inherited creative geography has shaped my own thinking about color. I wrote about that influence in how Josef Albers shaped the way I see color. For a geometric abstract painter with collectors across the New York metro area and beyond, New Haven offers something rare: a genuine creative community rooted in craft, rigor, and ambition.

That community extends beyond the studio and gallery walls. Being rooted here has opened doors to public art opportunities across Connecticut — including my 5x10ft installation at Southern Connecticut State University as part of the CT 1% for Art program. New Haven isn't just where I live — it's where my practice is grounded.

Explore the Work

The geometric abstract paintings and mixed media works that define my practice today were shaped — in no small part — by the focused creative time of the ECOCA residency. If you're looking for original art that carries that kind of intention and history, I'd love for you to explore the collection.

Shop Original Abstract Art

Commission an Original Work

Interested in a custom painting with the scale and energy of the work I developed during the residency? Learn more about commissioning an original painting — a one-of-a-kind work made specifically for your space and story.

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