Research Fellows
The Peter E. Pool Research Fellowships are funded with a generous gift from Nevada Museum of Art board member Dr. Peter E. Pool in the amount of $12,000 per year. Fellowships are awarded annually upon invitation from the Center for Art + Environment (the Center) for a term of one year.
The purpose of the Peter E. Pool Research Fellowship is to encourage serious engagements with materials held in the Center for Art + Environment Archive Collections, as well as the art collections of the Nevada Museum of Art.
Prior to the commencement of the Peter E. Pool Research Fellowship in 2018, the Center appointed Research Fellows for one-year unpaid terms. These individuals were recognized for existing or proposed projects that contributed unique and new understanding of how humans creatively interact with their natural, built, and virtual environments.
Peter E. Pool Research Fellows
Fallen Fruit (2023-2024)
The Fallen Fruit Collective, composed of artists David Allen Burns and Austin Young, was commissioned by the Museum in 2022 to create a large-scale public work of art entitled Monument to Sharing. The installation and renovation of the Wilbur D. May Sculpture Plaza are the first of a multi-phased Museum expansion scheduled for completion in early 2025. Monument to Sharing involves planting approximately twenty-one fruit-bearing trees, a berry patch and a series of edible pollinators that the public is welcome to “harvest,” inviting guests to explore ideas of generosity, agricultural production and the meaning behind “community.” The project will be completed in 2030. The fellowship was awarded specifically for the Center to collect a 20-year retrospective archive of the collaborative’s work.
Janna Ireland (2021-2023)
Janna Ireland, a Los-Angeles-based photographer, published last year a book of images taken of the work of well-known Black architect Paul Revere Williams. Ireland approaches Williams architecture from a fine arts perspective. She produces photographs that highlight the intimate interior and exterior details of his buildings, bringing her own poetic response to Williams’ work. Ireland recently completed a photographic project on William’s work in Southern California, which includes architectural styles, ranging from Spanish Mediterranean to Modern. Her fellowship will extend her coverage of his career in Nevada, including in Las Vegas, Reno, and Lovelock. In early 2022, the Museum will organize a major exhibition celebrating Williams through her work.
Jeff Kelly (2021-2023)
Jeff Kelley is an art critic, author, and curator. A practicing art critic since 1977, he worked in both Las Vegas and Reno before moving to California. His reviews and essays about artists have appeared in significant publications including Artforum, Art in America, and the Los Angeles Times. The University of California Press has published two books by Kelley: Essays on the Blurring of Art and Life, a collection of writings by American conceptual artist Allan Kaprow; and, of Childsplay: the Art of Allan Kaprow, published in 2004. Kelley will be researching and writing about late- 20th-century Nevada artists such as Robert McNamara in Reno and Bill Leaf in Las Vegas.
Past Research Fellows
2020 – 2021
Emily Eliza Scott
2019 – 2020
Jonathon Keats
2018 – 2019
Melissa Melero-Moose
2017 – 2019
Nina Elder, Erin Elder, Don Gill
2016 – 2018
Catherine Chalmers, Charles Lindsay, Erika Osborne
2015 – 2017
Trevor Paglen, Victoria McReynolds
2014 – 2016
Donald Fortescue, Susannah Sayler & Ed Morris, Bryndís Snæbjörnsdóttir & Mark Wilson
2013 – 2015
Charles Hood, Kelly Loudenberg
2012 – 2014
Cedra Wood, Jared Stanley, Ken Goldberg, David Stephenson & Martin Walch
2011 – 2013
Terry and Elizabeth Farnsworth, Geoff Manaugh and Nicola Twilley
2010 – 2012
David Abel, John Carty, Lea Rekow