A Unique Residency for Established and Emerging Artists… Only at Saint Kate

Now Presenting
Saint Kate’s Artist in Residence

Saint Kate – The Arts Hotel in downtown Milwaukee is among the first hotels to broadly celebrate the arts in its many forms – from painting and sculpture to music, poetry, and performing arts. To further our connection and support of the arts, Saint Kate is proud to announce its Artist in Residence program.

The residency is an opportunity available once per year for artists working in any genre or medium in the Midwest. The program supports artists by providing studio space, a stipend, consistent access to the Saint Kate Curator, a two-month exhibition within Saint Kate, and networking opportunities. The structure of The Artist in Residence program and the artist’s duties reflect the core values of Saint Kate: Creativity, Curiosity, Community, Collaboration, and Common Ground.

The Current Artist in Residence

Jeff Zimpel

Jeff Zimpel is an interdisciplinary artist whose art practice promotes the importance of life-long learning through an exploration of mark-making and an interrogation of the space where painting and photography meet. He develops site-specific installations and invites creative participation based on these art experiences.

Ultimately, an ecological approach to living and making underlines both the social and studio aspects of his art practice. Jeff’s work begins with the premise that every person is a mark-maker in multitudes, yet we have much to learn from marks made by the animate world around us: for instance, earth pigment-based paints tell us stories of place, brushes wash up on the shores of Lake Michigan, and nontraditional surfaces encourage divergent approaches to composition.

Jeff’s residency at Saint Kate grows and extends An Ecology of Marks, his ongoing community-based project that brings together a range of mark-makers to amplify and document the hope embedded within any given mark. In many ways, Jeff’s practice unearths an ecology that is already there: The Residency will evolve to reflect the contributions of hotel guests and visitors who enter Jeff’s studio and choose to collaborate and participate in his process.

Jeff is currently the Instructional Designer for Arts@Large in Walker's Point. He holds an MFA in Art & Social Engagement from UW-Milwaukee (‘21) and a BFA in Graphic Design from Cardinal Stritch University (‘09). He has previously taught art and design at the secondary and collegiate levels, and completed residencies with Arts@Large, Cedarburg Cultural Center, and Create Space MKE through Cardinal Stritch University.

Saintkate Arts

"This studio is alive. This studio is a composition. It draws us in through light and shadow, sound and color, movements and rhythms, and as we make our way through the gallery doors we enter an ecosystem of creative potential. This space is in a constant state of transformation, like a healthy forest."

Jeff Zimpel

Join Us

AIR Time: Art & Studio Tour

Join Artist in Residence Jeff Zimpel for a tour of the Saint Kate permanent collection, feature exhibitions, and his residency space: Studio Ecology.

Jeff will meet you at the bar where you’ll receive the signature cocktail, The Painter’s Mark. Together you’ll move through the public spaces of Saint Kate to view and discuss diverse works of art as part of our Seed Collection and rotating feature exhibitions. The tour will culminate in the Artist in Residence Studio where you will be invited to enter an ecosystem of creative potential, to participate in an ongoing process of mark-making and idea-sharing.

Saturdays (Through August 12)
5:00 PM

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