Like hundreds of visual artists across the globe, 25-year-old airbrush painter Syd Sauer Wilson opened their inbox on Friday, June 5, to what seemed like a chance of a lifetime: an invitation to join an artist residency hosted by Abstract Mag, a popular art-focused social media platform with more than 1 million followers, in an overseas program this summer.
The residency was described as an all-expenses-paid retreat in the mountainous regions of southern Georgia, where 40 visual artists would spend two weeks in August living in a “historic chateau” while developing their practices and taking part in excursions and activities designed to introduce them to the country’s culture and traditions. For an emerging artist eager for the opportunity to make work in a historic setting without paying for travel, materials, or lodging, the offer sounded ideal.
That was certainly true for Wilson, an early-career artist based in Los Angeles. After seeing an open call on Abstract Mag’s social media pages, they had applied to last year’s residency in Marseille, held at the 18th-century Château De Forbin, for a $40 fee. Although Wilson did not apply to this year’s Georgia program, they received an email in June from a member of the residency’s artist selection committee saying that, after being shortlisted last year, they had been personally invited to participate this August.
“We look forward to welcoming you to Georgia this summer,” the email’s closing line, obtained by Hyperallergic, states, alongside a link asking the artist to provide more details about their availability, travel plans, and any materials they would need during the residency. “ I was super, super excited,” Wilson told Hyperallergic. “I dropped down to the ground on my knees, and I was just like, ‘Oh my God.’ Throughout the day, I just kept looking up at the sky and saying, ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you.’ I called my parents, I shared the news with them, I shared the news with my friends.”
That excitement soon gave way to concern after Wilson went on social media and saw hundreds of artists saying they had received similar invitation emails for Abstract Mag’s Georgia residency, prompting questions within the art community about whether the program was real. In July, Abstract Mag said in Instagram posts that have since been deleted that 40 artists had been accepted, but artists later said they were left without responses after the residency’s social media accounts went dark.
