From 2015-2023, Art+Process+Ideas (A+P+I) was an artist-in-residence program that sought to expand the dialog around art and art-making on campus and throughout the Bay Area.
A partnership between Mills College Art Museum (MCAM) and the Art and Visual Culture Department, the A+P+I residency fostered interdisciplinary collaboration across departments and provided opportunities for Mills students, faculty, and staff, as well as the larger Bay Area arts community, to interact, learn, and work with the visiting artists.
Each year, art department faculty and museum staff nominated two-to-three contemporary Bay Area artists to move their practice to the Mills campus for six months. Throughout the residency term, A+P+I artists engaged with Mills art students through lunchtime presentations, open studio opportunities, studio visits with MFA students, and walkthroughs of the senior thesis exhibition. For developing artists, the residency provided immediate examples of how individual artists with divergent approaches to art-making model their practices.
In addition to an honorarium, A+P+I artists received a private studio and access to the facilities at Mills—workshops, labs, media centers, etc.—and the broad range of faculty expertise that a liberal arts college offers. Each A+P+I residency culminated in a summer exhibition at Mills College Art Museum that featured new work created by the artists during their time on campus.
Mills College had a long tradition of supporting artists, and this residency bolstered the campus' important role as a site for exploring new ideas in the arts.
