Vermont College of Fine Arts

Filmmaker Terence Nance, Faculty, MFA in Film, launches his latest film, An Oversimplification of Her Beauty, on Friday, April 26th in New York City theaters.

The MFA in Graphic Design spring residency is now in full swing. Don't miss the two exciting free and public lectures taking place this week: On Tuesday, April 16th, artist and designer Mylinh Trieu Nguyen will talk about work that explores ideas of distribution, collaboration and curation through new and appropriate frameworks, primarily in digital media.

Thanks to expanded capacity for 2013, VCFA’s annual Postgraduate Writers’ Conference (August 12-18) still has a few spots available in its small-group workshops in Poetry Manuscript.

Due to enthusiastic audience response and popular demand, the Green Mountain Film Festival will offer a second screening of Breakfast with Curtis, the charming and inspiring film by director and filmmaker Laura Colella, MFA in Film Faculty Cha

Kapulani (Anne) Landgraf, '95VA, was recently awarded a $20,000 Visual Arts Fellowship from Native Arts & Cultures Foundation. In its second year, the fellowships honor Native artists that have made a significant impact in their discipline, who are respected by their co

Joy Wulke, Artist Teacher in the MFA in Visual Art program, was on the winning team selected to transform the drab design of the Stamford, Connecticut train station, as part of a city-sponsored competition to bring art into public spaces.

Cross discipline collaboration...

The quarterly art journal X-TRA art journal published in Los Angeles features contributions by three MFA in Visual Art faculty members and artist-teachers in the recently released spring issue: Dont Rhine (faculty), Marie Shurkus (faculty) and Anoka Faruqee (artist-teacher).

Three faculty members from the MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults program have been selected as judges for the 2013 School Library Journal's Battle of the Kids' Books competition, an annual competition for sixteen of the very best books for young people of the year, judged by some of the biggest names in children’s books.

As part of the run up to this year’s American Spirit Awards, VCFA MFA in Film Faculty Chairand 2013 American Spirit Award nominee Laura Colella won a $50,000 grant from Film Independent in Los Angeles to help support distribution of her nominate

Sue William Silverman, creative nonfiction faculty member in the MFA in Writing Program, announces that the British edition of her memoir, Love Sick: One Woman’s Journey through Sexual Addiction, was included in a "Best of..." review of 2012 books -- selected by British authors -- in the Sunday Express.

The MFA in Visual Art jumpstarts its Winter 2013 residency with free public lectures by reknowned visiting artists/scholars. The first lecture is January 26th, "Disclosure" with Dalida Maria Benfield at 7:00 p.m. For a full schedule of the lectures as well as exhibitions taking place on VCFA campus, view or download the schedule here. All lectures take place in the College Hall chapel on the Montpelier campus (36 College Street.)

VCFA MFA in Writing faculty member Jen Bervin received a 2013 Creative Capital grant  in Literature for her project The Silk Poems.

"Wickedly good example of contemporary West Coast noir..." Congratulations, Sarah Maclay '02 Writing, for being one of Five American Poets to Watch in 2013, accord

MFA in Writing Residency – Public Events, January 2013

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Robin MacArthur's, '10, band Red Heart the Ticker (Robin and her husband Tyler Gibbons) has just announced "Songs in the Lunar Phase", a new song subscription service that delivers a brand-new Red Heart song monthly, on the day of the full moon.

VCFA MFA in Visual Art February 2012 Artist-in-Residence Wu Tsang was featured in The NewYork Times Sunday “Twelve for 12”.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults faculty member Leda Schubert's latest book, Monsieur Marceau: Actor Without Words, was just named one of the Best Children's Books of 2012 by Kirkus Reviews. 

The Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Graphic Design residency is in full swing and features an exhibit of 2nd and 3rd semester students' design work in Alumni Hall at 45 College Street. The gallery is open for critiques throughout the day, but the public is invited to stop in and have a look around, or even listen in on a critique.  

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumnus Harry Groome’s, '00, spoof of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy, The Girl Who Fished With A Worm, which originally appeared in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine has&

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Program current student Mathieu Cailler has won the first Short Story America Prize for Short Fiction.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Ellen Cassedy, ’94, has won the 2012 Translation Prize, with Yermiyahu Ahron Taub, awarded by the National Yiddish Book Center.  The award is for a translation from the Yiddish of a collection of short stories by Blume Lempel, a mid-20th-century writer who can be described as one part Grace Paley and one part Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Program faculty member Philip Graham's new memoir was just released from University Of Chicago Press.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults Program faculty member Leda Schubert's latest picture book was released today. 

Rose Metal Press just released the Field Guide to Writing Flash Nonfiction:  Advice and Essential Exercises from Respected Writers, Editors, and Teachers which features essay and exercises from several Vermont College of Fine Arts faculty, including Philip Graham, Patrick Madden, Rigoberto Gonzalez,

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member, poet Mary Ruefle, has won TheEditors Prize for Feature Article for 2012, an award given to poets, critics, and essayists featured in

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Chivas Sandage has released her first collection of poetry. The book, titled Hidden Drive, was release from Antrim House Books. 

Graduate Exhibitions

July 31st – August 3rd, 10am-7pm

College Hall Gallery & Alumni Hall

Public Lectures:

James Luna Wednesday, August 1st 4:15pm, College Hall Chapel

We have the winners for VCFA’s Give to Win Promotion!

The following people have won (though you ALL are winners!).

The British edition of Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Sue WilliamSilverman's memoir, Love Sick, published by Ebury Press, a subsidiary of Random House, was just published. 

It was announced yesterday that Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing current student Lee Pendleton (writing under the name Lee Thomas) has just won the Lambda Literary Award for his novel The German in the category of LGBT Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror.

On Friday, June 8, 2012, Vermont College of Fine Arts will showcase several of its MFA in Visual Art Alumni as part of the Montpelier Art Walk in two concurrent exhibitions.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults faculty member Uma Krishnaswami's recent book Out of the Way! Out of the Way! was mentioned in the May 11, 2012 New York Times Book Review.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Carol Bachofner was named the second Rockland Poet Laureate at the start of the annual event's Poetry Swarm evening April 26 at Rockland [Maine] Public Library. Bachofner takes the role of Rockland Poet Laureate over following a two-year term by Kendall A. Merriam, the post's inaugural honoree.

Congratulations to MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumna Skila Brown! Winner of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators Work-in-Progress grant, Skila’s debut middle grade novel, Caminar, will be published by Candlewick Press.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Sybil Baker's third book, titled  Into This World, will be released by Engine Books in May 2012.

Click here for more information.

Two of Leslie Ullman's poems -- "The Story I Need" and "Consider Desire" -- have been nominated for a Pushcart Prize by the Pushcart Board of Contributing Editors. Both poems were originally featured in Numéro Cinq.

Sophfronia Scott, current fiction student in the MFA in Writing program, talks book blurbs in a recent forum -- 'Riveting!': The Quandary of the Book Blurb -- featured in The New York Times.

An excerpt from VCFA President Tom Greene's new novel, The Headmaster's Wife, is featured at Numéro Cinq this week.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Neela Vaswani just released a new middle-grade novel. The book, titled Same Sun Here, was co-authored with Silas House and was released by Candlewick Press on February 14, 2012.

Click here for more information.

If you missed the Callithumpian Consort yesterday, not to worry – they’ll be performing again tonight, in the Chapel at 7:00 PM. The program will feature Alfred Schnittke’s Quintet for Piano and Strings as well as John Cage’s Music for Four.

MFA in Music Composition student Bill Stevens has been involved in the production of a remarkable CD to benefit Arts For Life, a non-profit organization that provides educational art programs to children with life-threatening illnesses and their families.

Join us and other west coast VCFA alums, students and faculty - writers, artists, musicians, and designers - for a first-of-its-kind reception in Los Angeles. at the Museum of Contemporary Art.

Thursday February 23, 2012
6:00 PM to 8:00 PM PST

A visual/poetic treat for the VCFA community: MFA in Writing faculty member Doug Glover recently shared on his blog, Numéro Cinq, a handful of little assemblage poems sent to him by MFA in Writing faculty member Mary Ruefle.

VCFA's MFA in Visual Art Program celebrates the graduation of the class of February 2012 on Saturday, February 4. Please join us in honoring these brilliant artists, live from College Hall Chapel in chilly but beautiful Montpelier, Vermont.

Click here at 6:00 pm (EST) to stream live.

MFA in Visual Art student Yukiyo Kawano has been taking us on a journey this residency, imagining a new way of what it means to "(re)tell a story." For 5-10 minutes each morning, Yuki has been lifting and lowering a large, 10' x 5' fiber sculpture hanging form the ceiling in Alumni Hall, developing with her fellow artists a performative aspect of the work.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Program alumna Micaela Myers ('03) is now the group editor for Firebrand Media which publishes  oversized, full-color luxury lifestyle magazines She is looking for new writers.

Visit the VCFA MFA in Writing Alumni Resource page for more information.

Congratulations to VCFA’s Writing for Children & Young Adults Program! Last week, the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) announced its 2012 list of Best Fiction for Young Adults, which included not one, not two, but EIGHT books by WCYA faculty and alumnae:

VCFA’s Postgraduate Writers’ Conference is now accepting enrollments for August 13-19, 2012. Once again, this annual gathering for experienced writers presents a stellar faculty for its small-group workshops in Creative Nonfiction, Novel, Short Story, Poetry, Poetry Manuscript, and Writing for Young Adults.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Program alumna Judith Gold Stitzel has released a new book titled Field Notes from Grief. The book represents a collaboration of author Judith Gold Stitzel and artist Claudia Giannini, based on the journals Judith kept during the year after her husband died.

Vermont College of Fine Arts (VCFA), a national center for graduate education in the fine arts, announced today that Matthew Monk, Professor of Graphic Design at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), has been named Academic Dean beginning July 1, 2012.

VCFA faculty Connie May Fowler reports the following great news: THE OTHER WOMAN, which has been adapted to the theater in a production that includes one of my essays, will go into development at The Berkeley Repertory Theater this summer, with a 4-6 week run planned for the Rep's season. The goal is to launch the play for a national run and then take it to New York. With the Rep behind it, and Jonathan Reinis producing---a collaboration that has sent several plays to Broadway---this dream has an excellent chance of being fulfilled (thank you, Victoria Zackheim, for the wording).

The January installment of the “Voices from Hunger Mountain” series comes from HM's Editor, Miciah Bay Gault. Read her short essay, "My Love Affair with Slush," here.

Authors Marla Frazee and Libba Bray reading from their work last night at Vermont College of Fine Arts Writing for Children & Young Adults winter residency.

(photos by Roger Crowley)

Day two. Our second day, a day to be settled in enough to learn that paradise, while still paradise, is imperfect. The pipes in Old San Juan, for example, are delicate, some barely fizzling out enough water to rinse our hair. The humidity is high, the cobblestones slick and uneven, and around the square is a young man cranking bass loud enough to rattle his windows. There are stray cats all along the cars parked along the narrow streets—some sleeping in the tire wells, some crouched under the shade of the bumpers, others sunning themselves on the roofs.

Day one. Monday, the second day of this new year. Our adventure began in cities and towns across the United States—Montpelier, Little Rock, San Francisco, and Las Vegas, to name a few—and there’s even one of us all the way from Australia. Some of us were already here in Puerto Rico, but most began cozied in their own bed this morning.

Seven degrees with a wind chill of minus twelve. A few inches of snow covered the paths as new Writing students made their way from Dewey to College Hall. The sound of heavy winter boots trudged up to the fourth floor, while students milled in the warmth and cheer of the bookstore, drinking coffee, browsing. 3:00 Orientation in the Chapel. Winter 2012 MFA in Writing Residency has begun.......

Vermont College of Fine Arts alumnus Christopher Soden has a new poetry Collection. The book, titled Closer, was released this year from Queer Mojo (A Rebel Satori Imprint).

Click here for more information.

Grab a cup of coffee and cozy up with the short story "Lady Day," by MFA in Writing faculty chair Xu Xi. It is featured in a recent posting at Numéro Cinq.   

MFA in Writing's Faculty Chair Xu Xi helped design Asia's first low-residency Masters in Fine Arts (MFA) in Creative Writing program - also the world's only program with a focus on Asia. It has run since 2010 under the aegis of the City University of Hong Kong's English department.

Finally, that familiar nip in the air and a holiday spring in our steps. In conjunction with The Vermont College Alumni Association, VCFA cordially invites you to Illumination Night, December 2, from 5:30-7:30 pm.

Vermont College of Fine Art’s MFA Program in Music Composition invites musicians to infuse their creativity with new energy and ideas, enriching their vitality as artists and redefining themselves as composers. The program carves out space in the lives of professional musicians and music teachers for inquiry and experimentation as well as research and critique, making room for both the exploration and the refinement of their craft.

Patricia Hampl

Distinguished Visiting Faculty - Creative Nonfiction

It was summer. The campus lit up with the hazy greenery of a hot July day. Students and faculty engaged in workshop. Focused. Challenging each other. And then it hit:  We write creative nonfiction, but what defines it? What are its boundaries and its limits, if any?

Like to see your holiday purchases do a little good in the world? Look no further than the SisterScarf Fund, co-founded by VCFA's MFA in Graphic Design faculty member Natalia Ilyin.

It seemed to vanish almost as quickly as it had appeared, like a circus tent  in the middle of a prairie town. Swiss Posters 100 + Posters 50 + Years filled the Gymnasium turned art gallery on Friday night.

Exhibition Reception Tonight

Free & Open to the Public

6-8pm

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Shawn Fawson has won the 2010 Utah Book Award in the category of Poetry. She won for her poetry collection titled Giving Way, published by The Bitter Oleander Press.

Robert Vivian, core faculty in both fiction and creative nonfiction at Vermont College of Fine Arts, has won the prestigious Nebraska Book Award in Fiction for his novel, Lamb Bright Saviors.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Program alumnus Ben Westlie's first poetry collection has been released for pre-orders. Titled Sometimes Out of Turn, it is being published by Finishing Line Press.

Click here for more information.

The Vermont Arts Council announced today that Governor Peter Shumlin has appointed Sydney Lea as Vermont’s next Poet Laureate. Syd Lea has had a long association with Vermont College of Fine Arts, first as a member of the MFA in Writing Program faculty from 1989-2002 and then as a founding member of the VCFA Board of Trustees.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Susan Spencer Smith has released a new novel. Titled Depth-of-Field, about " a woman trying to find her voice as an artist and a female in the social shifts precipitated by the second wave of feminism." 

Click here for more information.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults Program alumna Marianna Baer's first novel released today. Titled Frost,  it is a young adult, supernatural thriller published by Balzer & Bray.

Click here for more information.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults faculty member Alan Cumyn, announced the release of his latest young adult novel, Tilt. Of the book Alan says "It's a funny, sexy story about a teenaged boy's obsessions as he lives through an impossibly absurd time of life." The Junior Library Guild in the U.S.

Deadlines for MFA in Visual Art and MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults are fast approaching. Get your applications in now for the winter semester for both of these leading MFA programs. On the fence? Have questions? Unsure how to work and get your degree at the same time? Contact one of our knowledgeable admissions counselors today.

MFA in Writing alumna Shirley Nestler (1994) just published One Infantryman’s Journey.  A story of and co-authored by her cousin Walter Mahlon Zweizig, the book recounts his experiences in the United States Army during the Korean War.Fresh from the farmlands of Pennsylvania Dutch country, Walt is thrown into a violent conflict that threatens to test his faith at every turn.

The Callithumpian Consort, led by Director Stephen Drury, are the first visiting ensemble for the inaugural residency of the newly-launched MFA in Music Composition program.  The MFA in Music Composition Residency takes place from August 9-15.  (Photo credit: Roger Crowley) 

The Master of Fine Arts in Music Composition is underway, with students from as far away as Taiwan.

The MFA in Visual Art's graduation will take place tomorrow evening, August 6th, in the Chapel of College Hall in front of family, friends, classmates, faculty, staff and a host of well-wishers.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults faculty member Leda Schubert's latest book was just released from Holiday House. Reading to Peanut is a picture book about a young girl named Lucy who wants to learn to read and write.

Click here for more information.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2A30tJAH3s&feature=player_embedded

Vermont College of Fine Arts to Host Renowned Callithumpian Consort During Inaugural MFA in Music Composition Residency

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Jan Groft has won bronze in the category of Body, Mind and Spirit in ForeWord Review's 2010 Book of the Year Awards. She won for her non-fiction book, As We Grieve: Discoveries of Grace in Sorrow.

Click here for more information.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Program alumna Lauren Markham was just awarded a 2011 Fellowship in Environmental Journalism from Middlebury College. As part of this work Lauren will be spending the year researching the plight of climate migrants in East Africa and examining the prospects of international protection for communities forced out of their homes at the hands of a changing landscape.

VCFA to Welcome the 13 Indigenous Grandmothers

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Richard Jackson has won the 2011 Eric Hoffer Award for Poetry. He won for his poetry collection titled Resonance, published by Ashland Poetry Press.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Visual Art Program alumna Barbara Sullivan has been awarded her second Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Individual Support Grant. The Individual Support Grant from the Gottlieb Foundation is awarded in recognition of the quality of an artist’s work, with much importance given to the artist’s dedication to that work over a period of many years.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumna Jandy Nelson's young adult book The Sky is Everywhere was named a  2011 Northern California Independent Booksellers Association Book of the Year in the category of Teen Lit.

Click here for more information.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Nance Van Winckel has won the Prairie Schooner Edward Stanley Award for her nine poems that appeared in the summer issue. Her fifth collection of poems, No Starling, is recently out from the University of Washington Press. In addition to two National Endowment for the Arts poetry fellowships, she has received awards from the Poetry Society of America, Poetry, and Prairie Schooner.

Click here for more information.

It has just been announced that Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Mary Ruefle has won the 2011 William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America. Endowed by the family and friends of Geraldine Clinton Little, a poet and author of short stories and former vice-president of the PSA, the award is given  for the best book of poetry  published by a small, non-profit or university press.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Program alumnus Philip Tate has won first prize in the 6th Annual Black Warrior Review Fiction Contest, 2011. He won for his short story titled "Dam" which appears in the publication's latest issue, 37.2.

Click here for more information.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Faculty Chair and author Xu Xi will be featured on RADIO FREE AWP at this year's Association for Writers and Writers Programs (AWP) annual conference from Washington DC. 

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumnus Michael Hemery has a new book titled No Permanent Scars coming out on January 31, 2011 from Silenced Press. The book is a collection of non-fiction stories about "childhood, adulthood, the neighborhood and what it means to be a kid, a parent, a teacher, a human."

Please join Vermont College of Fine Arts for an MFA in Visual Art reception at CAA (College Art Association) in New York on February 11. Alumni/ae, Artist-Teachers, current and prospective students welcome. Please RSVP to admissions@vermontcollege.edu.

We hope to see you there!

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumnus Trent Reedy is the subject of an article in today's Los Angeles Times. The piece is about his new novel, Words in the Dust and the girl and story that inspired it.

Click here to read the article.

Montpelier, Vermont (January 15, 2011) – VCFA Faculty member Rita Williams-Garcia, author of “One Crazy Summer,” received a 2011 Coretta Scott King Book Award honoring African American authors and illustrators of outstanding books for children and young adults. The award was announced  at the American Library Association (ALA) Midwinter Meeting, held January 7 – 11 in San Diego, and will be presented in New Orleans at the ALA Annual Conference in Ju

Montpelier, Vermont (January 4, 2011) – Vermont College of Fine Arts (VCFA) is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Tamar Diesendruck as Faculty Chair for its new MFA program in Music Composition.  Diesendruck is a distinguished composer and a passionate teacher whose work has been performed around the world.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing current student Ross McMeekin will be blogging during the course of the current winter residency, which runs from December 29 through January 7.

Excerpt below:

Vermont College of Fine Arts President Thomas Christopher Greene appeared on Vermont Public Television's Profile this week. Click here to watch this half-hour, in-depth interview with Fran Stoddard.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumna Ann Angel's book, Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing, is among five books that have been shortlisted for  2011  Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults, which honors the best nonfiction books written for young adults between Nov. 1, 2009 and Oct. 31, 2010.

The Kirkus Best Children's Book of 2010 list was just released, and there is strong representation from alumni and faculty of Vermont College of Fine Arts' MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults Program.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Patricia Spears Jones has just released her third poetry collection. The book, titled Pain Killers, was released from Tia Chucha Press.

Click here for more information.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Visual Art alumna Krisanne Baker's film, Upstream to Downstream, won the Experimental Audience Award in this year's New England Film Festival.  This experimental documentary short "examines the systems of our culture, of which we are all participants; we dump unfathomable amounts of pollutants and DNA altering chemicals into our streams and rivers which eventually end in

It was just announced that a novel from Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults Program faculty member Rita Williams Garcia is once again a finalist for this year's National Book Award.

It was announced today that Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumna Jandy Nelson's latest novel, The Sky is Everywhere, has been shortlisted for a Silver Inky Award, Australia's biggest award for young adult literature. The Silver Inky is specifically for international books.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumna Bethany K. Dellinger won an Honorable Mention in the First Annual SCBWI Carolinas Art and Writing Contest for the opening pages of The Darkening, a young adult mythic fantasy, as announced here.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna  LeAnne Howe, an enrolled citizen of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, will receive the Tulsa Library Trust’s “American Indian Author Award."  Howe writes fiction, poetry, screenplays and plays dealing with American Indian experiences.  Her works have been translated in France, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark.  Currently, Howe is Professor of American Ind

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Moira Linehan received the 2010 Foley Poetry Award from America Magazine for her poem, "Last Wishes." 

The poem can be accessed through the magazine's website.

It was just announced that Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumnus Lou Mathews has won the failbetter.comTenth Anniversary Novella Contest for his piece titled The I

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Faculty Chair Xu Xi has a new novel titled Habits of a Foreign Sky releasing in October, 2010 from Haven Books. The novel's main character is a mixed-race, single mother who buries her mother and young son in less than two years. All she has left is a hard-won career at a global investment bank.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumnua Lynn Levin's newest collection of poems, Fair Creatures of an Hour (Loonfeather Press), was a finalist in poetry for the 2010 Next Generation Indie Book Awards.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumnus Richard Hartshorn latest published work, a story titled "Sorry, Dani," is in the new issue of Hawaii Women's Journal. 

Click here to visit the publication's website.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Lyn Chamberlin has a new nonfiction piece coming out in the next issue of The Potomac Review. The piece, titled“Somewhere in the North Atlantic,” will be published in their September issue.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Visiting Faculty Connie May Fowler: has a short story titled "Do Not Enter the Memory" in Oxford American's Future of the South edition this September. 

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Emilie Bilman's doctoral thesis has been published as a book by Lambert Academic Publishing. The work is titled The Psychodynamics of Poetry: Poetic Virtuality and Oedipal Sublimation in the Poetry of TS Eliot and Paul Valéry. 

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Elena Harap is a contributor and editor to a new anthology of poetry and short prose titled The Bones We Carry, a collection of work by a multicultural Boston-based group of writer-performers.  Included are Elena's essay "Night Room" and several poems.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Nance Vanwinckel created the following video to document the work of the students during this past MFA in Writing residency's Off the Page workshop.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumnus Nicholas Benson has translations of poems by Aldo Palazzeschi in Octopus 13, Pequod 51, and Poetry International 15/16. 

Click here to view a PDF version of Vermont College of Fine Arts latest newsletter. This issue is filled with alumni news, feature articles on alums and faculty members, and news about the goings-on, on campus and around the world.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Program alumna Joan Leegant announces the release of her  novel titled Wherever You Go. The novel is published by W.W. Norton.

For more information visit the author's website.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumna Sundee Frazier has just released her second middle grade novel, titled The Other Half of My Heart.

Exciting news from HungerMountain.  The winners of the first Hunger Mountain Young Writers’ Prize have just been announced. The prize, judged by National Book Award winner M.T.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumna Jessica Leader was featured this past weekend in an article in the Kentucky Courier-Journal about her new novel, Nice and Mean.

Click here to read the article.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Philip Graham's book, The Moon, Come to Earth: Dispatches from Lisbon is going to be translated into Portuguese and released from Editorial Presença in April 2011.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Visual Art alumnus Larry Caveney's latest video features an intervention that was done in response to rejection from the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD) show Here Not There: San Diego Art Now.  He also put together Rejected from Here Not There: San Diego a group exhibit that includes the work of artists who were rejected from the MCASD show. Larry explains that "one of the cameras and mike was left at the bag check-in, hence the one sided audio; serurity was tight that day."

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Iris Gomez's debut novel, Try to Remember, was just released from Grand Central Publishing. The novel tells the tale of  "a  Colombian teenager struggling to forge her own identity in the changing cultural landscape of 1970s Miami, while keeping her increasingly volatile, mentally ill father out of legal trouble."

Staff, faculty and alumni from Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Childern & Young Adults Program will be presenting at the CANSCAIP conference (Canadian Society of Children's Authors, Illustrators and Performers) in Montreal this weekend.  The event is titled "Imagine a Story" and is a one-day conference for emerging and established creators of works for children.

To learn more about the event visit the website.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumna Lauren Myracle has a new book being released on May 4th. The novel, titled Thirteen Plus One, is the latest in a series of middle grade novels that follow the life of the same character, Winnie Perry.

The Lifetime Movie based on Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Sue William Silverman's memoir Love Sick: One Woman's Journey Through Sexual Addiction, is now available online in its entirety. The film, starring Sally Pressman (from "Army Wives") can be viewed on My Lifetime, click here.

The Summer 2010 issue of Brilliant Corners: A Journal of Jazz & Literature is now available. The journal is edited by Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Sascha Feinstein and this particular issue includes an interview with and poetry by our own Betsy Sholl.

Copies can be ordered on the Journal's website.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults faculty member, Leda Schubert, has announced signings for her new picture book, Feeding the Sheep. They are scheduled in various places in New England throughout 2010:

May 1: Bear Pond Books, Montpelier, VT

May 13: Porter Square Books, Cambridge, MA

May 15: New England SCBWI conference, Fitchburg, MA

In this week's New York Times, two members of Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults program faculty have books on the Bestseller List.

Writer John Warner interviews Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Philip Graham in the current issue of The Morning News.com. Warner talks to the author (who is also his former professor) about "finding topics, developing mentors, and reaching readers."

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults faculty member Cynthia Leitich Smith's novel Eternal is on this week's New York Times Bestseller List. The paperback version of this young adult paranormal romance novel was just released last month.

Vermont College of Fine Arts Board of Trustees member and new National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature Katherine Paterson is featured in several articles (as well as appearing on the cover) in the current March/April 2010 issue of The Horn Book Magazine, the publication for children's and young adult literature.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing alumna Pamela Gemin has a new book of poetry published by The University of Arkansas Press. The book, Another Creature, was a finalist in this year's Inaugural Miller Williams Arkansas Poetry Prize.

Meg Wiviott, a current student in Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults Program, announces the release of her picture titled Benno and th

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing For Children & Young Adults alumna Zu Vincent recently released a new young adult book entitled Catherine the Great: Empress of Russia as part of the Wicked History Series from Franklin Watts.

Click here for more information on the book.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults alumna Ricki Thompson's first novel is due out this month. City of Cannibals, a historical fiction novel for young adults, will be released from Boyds Mill Press on February 1, 2010.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults Program has received incredible news from two of its alumnae this weekend.

It was just announced today that VCFA MFA in Writing For Children & Young Adults alumna Kekla Magoon has been nominated for a NAACP Image Award in the category of Outstanding Literary Work for Youth/Teens. The results will be broadcast on Fox Television on February 26, 2010.

For more information visit their website.

As of this week visitors to campus can enjoy our new ice skating rink located on the Vermont College of Fine Arts green.

MFA in Writing alumnus Gary Miller took this photo of alumna Deb Fleischman and their kids enjoying a brisk holiday skate and taking the time to spell out V-C-F-A.

A new exhibition at the Silvermine Guild Arts Center, located in New Canaan, CT, features the work of two alumnae of VCFA's MFA in Visual Art Program.

VCFA MFA in Writing alumna Marni Jameson has a new book coming out from Decapo Books. It's entitled House of Havoc and will be released on February 1, 2010.

Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing faculty member Sascha Feinstein’s  The Jazz Fiction Anthology, edited by Sascha and David Rife, has just been published by Indiana University Press. The anthology includes stories by 29 writers, including James Baldwin, Amiri Baraka, Michelle Cliff, Julio Cortazar, Ralph Ellison, Langston Hughes, Eudora Welty, John Edgar Wideman, and VCFA's own Xu Xi.

Riki Moss, VCFA visual art graduate 1994, has been invited to participate in an international exhibition in Nagoya, Japan, celebrating the year 2010 as the year of biodiversity. She will be sharing an installation space of 1200 square feet with three other Vermont artists and participating in workshops and panel discussions for 10 days in Nagoya.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Julia Keller just wrote a review of VCFA MFA in Writing Program faculty member Philip Graham's new book, The Moon, Come to Earth, for the Chicago Tribune.

Don't miss the article in Chicago's Daily Herald about how VCFA's MFA in Visual Art alumna Leisa Corbett's work is to be included in the new Hollywood film The Men Who Stare at Goats. Corbett's charcoal and pastel piece hangs on a wall right behind actor George Clooney's desk.  

Philip Graham's latest book, The Moon, Come to Earth: Dispatches from Lisbon, has just been published by the University of Chicago Press.  Philip is currently on tour for the book, and his tour dates for the fall can be found at McSweeney's: 

Vermont College of Fine Arts' own MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults faculty member Rita Williams Garcia's book Jumped was named a finalist for the National Book Award in Young People's Literature today. Click here for a full list of 2009 finalists.

The winner of the Katherine Paterson Prize for Young Adult and Children’s Writing is Liz Cook from Roslindale, Massachusetts, the editor of Hunger Mountain announced . Ms. Cook’s short story for young adults, “Crazy Cat” has earned her a $1,000 prize and publication in Hunger Mountain, the national arts journal published by Vermont College of Fine Arts.

The Heard Museum in Phoenix announced the appointment of Vermont College of Fine Arts Board of Trustees member Letitia Chambers as the institution's new Executive Director. Letitia is the first person of American Indian heritage to hold the position, and the second woman.  

"Figments: Conversations with Andy Warhol" is Alumna Madelyn Roehrig's ongoing project in which visitors to Warhol's grave site are encouraged to ask questions and leave comments. Roehrig's  final installation at VCFA centered on this project. Read more about Roehrig's work in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

 Hunger Mountain, the national arts periodical published at Montpelier’s Vermont College of Fine Arts, will now reach a global audience thanks to the launch of its online incarnation, which debuted on July 31, 2009: www.hungermtn.org.

Vermont College of Fine Arts invites area residents to a series of lectures by visiting artists, August 2-4, and to a series of student exhibitions, August 4-8. The events are held in coordination with the MFA in Visual Art program at VCFA.

 Fearless Confessions: A Writer’s Guide to Memoir Offers Beginning and Experienced Writers Alike An Indispensable Road Map for Writing Life Stories

Vermont College of Fine Arts will host an outdoor film series this summer, “Movies on the Hill.” Eight free films will be shown on Friday evenings throughout the summer on the VCFA green, from July 10 to August 28. (In case of rain on Friday night, films will be shown on Saturday night.) The films are as follows:

VCFA president Tom Greene was featured on Vermont Public Radio today, one year after the college declared its independence.

Interview with Tom Greene on VPR.net

More than 50 vintage cars gathered at Vermont College of Fine Arts Wednesday for a meeting of the New England Brass & Gas Tour. Photo by Roger Crowley

The MFA in Writing program is pleased to announce that three alumni/ae are recipients of recent National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowships. Congratulations go out to Nickole Brown (1/03), Bob Hicok (7/05) and Maggie Jaffe (1/01)!

Just in from VCFA MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults faculty member Alan Cumyn: "My little book Dear Sylvia has won the Silver Birch Express award as voted on by thousands of school kids in Ontario.

by Shaindel Beers, released by Salt Publishing in January 2009. Shaindel (MFAW 1/05) worked with advisors Natasha Saje, Clare Rossini, Richard Jackson, and Leslie Ullman. She also worked with many other VCFA faculty as workshop leaders, including Betsy Sholl, Nance van Winckel, Jody Gladding, and Mary Ruefle, among others.

Micol Ostow, a January '09 graduate of the MFA in Writing for Children program, will have her creative thesis, So Punk Rock (and Other Ways to Disappoint your Mother), released in July 2009. Micol worked on her thesis during each semester with faculty members Kathi Appelt, Uma Krishnaswami, Tim Wynne-Jones, and Louise Hawes.

Patricia Spear Jones's book, The Weather that Kills, grew out of her MFA thesis. Several of the poems, most notably "The Usual Suspect", "Joss Sticks", and "The Birth of the Rhythm and Blues" were developed under the guidance of Lynda Hull, Mark Doty and David Rivard. Rivard's sharp eye really helped her arrange the collection.

“Giving up the Ghost was the first novel I sold after graduation.  The idea for this book grew out of a chapter I submitted for my first workshop with Phyllis Root and Carolyn Coman, and was nurtured from an emotional standpoint by Louise Hawes that first semester when she encouraged me to write about my fears.”

Vermont College of Fine Arts and Hunger Mountain: The VCFA Journal of the Arts Announce the Katherine Paterson Prize for Young Adult (YA) and Children’s Writing

Montpelier, Vt. – December 11, 2008 - Vermont College of Fine Arts, a graduate school for visual art and writing based in Montpelier, Vermont, today announced the appointed of Bob Atwell to its Board of Directors.

 Montpelier, Vt. – November 4, 2008 - Poets, friends, and family of Hayden Carruth will gather on Sunday, November 16 from 3–5:00 p.m. for a free public celebration of the Vermont poet’s life and work. The celebration will take place in the Chapel at Vermont College of Fine Arts, 36 College Street in Montpelier.