“Amid a time of uncertainty, artist residencies can safeguard long-span creative work by offering artists a sense of security, space, and opportunities for connection,” writes Sirpa Pietikäinen, who was Chair of the Advisory Board of the Saari Residence until 2025.

In times of instability – whether due to war, the effects of climate change, political oppression or economic collapse – artist residencies become critical infrastructure, not a luxury.

Uncertainty narrows our field of observation and focuses our thinking on the present and the near future. At such a time, however, we would also need a broader analysis, an understanding of the changing circumstances, new ideas, and the ability to see opportunities, different ways of doing things, and different visions of the future. Creativity and art in and of themselves, but also as a strategic means of survival. We need to take special care of artists at times like these. They often find themselves in dire straits and at risk of losing their creative capacity, their ability to function, or even their lives under the pressure of such times.

Psychological stability is a prerequisite for creative work. Uncertainty disrupts concentration. Anxiety about rent, food, safety or the future triggers the brain’s threat detection system, which stifles the open, exploratory thinking necessary for creative work. Residences often eliminate these immediate threats by providing for basic needs – housing, workspace, meals and sometimes also healthcare. It is not merely a matter of convenience, but a cognitive prerequisite. During a residency, an artist’s nervous system can shift from a state of survival to the so-called default mode network, where associative thinking, the integration of memories, and leaps of imagination take place.

Residences As Centres of Solidarity

During Lebanon’s economic collapse in 2020, several small residences (such as Ashkal Alwan’s off programme) provided not only workspace but also fuel, internet access and meal allowances. The artists said that without this support, they would have had to abandon their months-long projects in order to work their day jobs.

Instability often prevents access to specialised materials such as fabric, film, ceramic kilns, digital machining tools, and even a reliable power supply. The residency can serve as a small, flexible hub: shared resources, shared tools, on-site technicians and alternative energy sources. Even more radically, residencies can operate by shifting to local, low-tech, or recycled materials, transforming scarcity into an aesthetic constraint. This is different from an artist struggling on their own. The residency fosters a collective material intelligence.

During the siege of Sarajevo (1992–96), the Obala Art Center continued to house artists in its basement, powered by generators. They made ink from ash and rainwater, and stretched canvases over salvaged wood. The art created during that period – much of it the siege itself – could not have come into being without that shared physical infrastructure.

It is important to combat loneliness through structural solidarity. Instability causes atomization. People seek refuge with their families, flee, or stay in their homes. For artists, this often means losing out on critical dialogue – in the form of informal criticism, hallway conversations and late-night debates on form and shape. Residencies are designed to foster a sense of community and provide structured time for exchange. But more important than mere sociability is the fact that they can create what Hannah Arendt called “space of appearance”: a place where people present themselves and their work to others, thus affirming that their work matters.

In times of instability, this is radical. It says: your artistic vision matters, and coming together around it is important. Many residencies now incorporate trauma-informed facilitation, conflict mediation and care protocols into their programs, recognising that artists arriving from the midst of war or economic collapse may need special support.

A Foundation for Long-term Artistic Thinking

The freedom to work slowly and non-instrumentally is essential for creativity and for allowing ideas to mature. A crisis calls for a swift response. Journalists, aid workers and activists are working on a tight schedule. Art often operates on its own timeline – spanning years, decades or even generations. But in times of uncertainty, external pressure mounts: “Work on something useful” – even if it’s just a protest sign or a fundraising video. Residencies can support long-term, non-instrumental or even seemingly pointless work. This isn’t about escaping reality. Some of the sharpest cultural-critical analyses of instability emerge only years later, precisely because they have been given time to mature.

Rijksakademie in Amsterdam continued its two-year residencies through the 2008 financial crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic. Several alumni have later noted that this uninterrupted period made possible works that addressed these crises indirectly – not as reportage, but as structural analysis concealed within the form, such as Melanie Bonajo’s films on economic uncertainty and touch.

Residencies can provide the means to maintain mobility and circumvent dysfunctional local systems in difficult situations. When local galleries close, funding dries up, or censorship tightens, an artist residency can serve as a temporary lifeline for an artist’s career. International residencies offer visas, travel opportunities and access to various market or institutional circles. More importantly, they can provide legal and administrative protection. For example, an artist from an authoritarian country can apply for asylum or resettlement through residency networks (such as ICORN or the Safe Haven residencies).

After Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, dozens of residences across Europe activated emergency programs – offering not only free accommodation, but also legal aid and language courses.

Places of Memory

Residencies can help preserve the memory that spans generations and disciplines. Instability often disrupts cultural continuity: archives burn, older generations pass away and institutions collapse. Residencies can serve as living archives by bringing together artists from different generations and disciplines. A younger artist fleeing climate displacement might share a space with an older artist who survived the previous war. Techniques, stories and tacit knowledge are passed down not through documents, but through communal living and informal master-apprentice learning. This is particularly important for physical or oral forms of art, such as dance, theatre, storytelling and crafts. The kitchen or garden of the residence may become a more important place for passing down experience than the studios.

Amplifying the voices of those on the margins is essential when the mainstream’s attention is focused elsewhere. In times of instability, the media and financial institutions often focus on the most visible crises, while slower or more complex emergencies – such as debt, slow violence or environmental degradation – remain underreported. Residencies can consciously prioritise artists from these overlooked contexts. They also provide an opportunity to develop work that counters the sensationalism of the news – art that constructs frameworks for understanding instability as a long, uneven process rather than a spectacular event.

For example, residencies focused on climate change (such as The Arctic Circle, an international residency programme established in 2009) give artists the opportunity to work on the timescale of glaciers and forests, not the news cycle. Their exhibitions, books, scores and other works often reach audiences only years later and help shape a lasting cultural memory.

Crises Give Rise to NewInitiatives

Residencies can also serve as training facilities for alternative institutions. In times of instability, traditional art institutions – museums, foundations and government agencies – may freeze their budgets, cancel their programmes or collapse entirely. Residencies are relatively informal, flexible and often run by the artists themselves. They can serve as prototypes for future models: decentralised, mutual-aid-based, low-overhead models for supporting cultural work.

Many of today’s most sustainable residency models have emerged in the wake of past crises. The MacDowell Colony was founded in the aftermath of the Great Depression, the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center during post-World War II reconstruction, and the more recent grassroots residencies, such as SÍM in Iceland following the 2008 economic collapse, or Djerassi following budget cuts in California. Everyone adapted to the scarcity by focusing on what an artist truly needs: time, space and a small, supportive community.

In times of uncertainty, artist residencies shift from being career accelerators to career sustainers, and even more fundamentally, to infrastructures for survival and the creation of meaning. They protect not only the artist’s work, but also the artist’s ability to think, feel and connect with others. In this way, they preserve a fundamental human function: the ability to transform instability into form rather than being crushed by it.

Residency programmes could give rise to a number of innovative structures and practices. These are not merely minor improvements but potential paradigm shifts – ways in which residencies can respond to instability proactively and creatively.

Changing Residencies

One might wonder whether we need to redefine the entire concept of the artist-in-residence programme in a global context where instability is becoming the norm. Could the residency serve as a place of care or a site for trauma and reconstruction work on the outskirts of crisis zones? One residency could combine art, research and direct action, while another could focus on eco-social work. Perhaps the residency could also serve as a legal safe haven. What if the residency was decentralised or mobile? What would a mentoring residency look like, one that would bring together artists from different fields and of different ages? Could a long-term residency also mean an opportunity to return regularly to recuperate over the years? The residency also serves as a concept and a network, without a fixed location. What would a network of all these different residencies look like, where their various strengths and priorities would complement one another?

At the heart of all these ideas lies the same theme: a residency is no longer just a temporary workspace, but rather an infrastructure for sharing time and space that takes responsibility for the artist’s well-being, continuity and survival. In practice, this means that the residencies must develop their expertise in trauma work, conflict mediation, financial counselling, legal assistance and long-term follow-up.

The good news is that artist-in-residence programmes can be the first to respond to environmental, social and cultural crises – acting more quickly and flexibly than governments or traditional art financiers. And they can do so while preserving what makes residencies unique: intimacy, trust, and the time and space for experimentation. The future of residency programmes is not just about preserving the old ways, but about structural innovation. This requires the ability to transform residencies into systems that not only protect artists but also prepare them to operate in a world where instability is the new normal.

Residency programmes are, and should be, part of the cultural and artistic backbone for survival. This is especially needed now, when artistic freedom is under threat and political extremism is becoming mainstream. At the same time, the ability of societies to understand what is happening and cope with the changes ahead is being put to the test. These threats are directed not only at art, but at the very survival of human civilization.

That is why residencies and their resilience are far more important than we might realise at this moment in time.