Open Call: 2025 Public Artists in Residence with the City of New York

The NYC Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA) is seeking four artists to join its Public Artists in Residence (PAIR) program in 2025. An artist will be placed in residence with each of the following City agencies: the Office of Housing Recovery Operations, Small Business Services, and the Mayor's Public Engagement Unit. 

 

ABOUT PAIR 

PAIR is based on the premise that artists are creative problem solvers. To that end, DCLA embeds socially engaged artists in New York City municipal agencies to utilize their creative, collaborative art practice to offer innovative solutions to pressing civic challenges. Launched in 2015, the PAIR program takes its name and inspiration from the pioneering work of artist Mierle Laderman Ukeles, the City’s first official artist in residence (1977), with the NYC Department of Sanitation. Since establishing the program, DCLA has embedded 24 artists in 15 agencies, including Amanda Phingbodhippakia at the Commission on Human Rights, Tania Bruguera at the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, Yazmany Arboleda at the Civic Engagement Commission, among others. The most recent cohort of PAIRs included theater artist Modesto Flako Jimenez, who worked with NYC Health + Hospitals’ “Guns Down, Life Up” program, and multidisciplinary artist Carlos Irijalba, who worked with the Department of Design and Construction to realize an ambitious, site-specific sculptural work as part of the East Side Costal Resiliency Project. For a full list of PAIRs to date, click here.  

  

All of the PAIR partnerships vary greatly in concept, scope, duration, and populations engaged, and their successes are driven by the openness of the partner agencies and the artist-led, collaborative process that the PAIR program framework provides. Artists who are flexible, adaptable, and can maneuver through different situations and populations are encouraged to apply. 

 

Residency Structure 

Each PAIR residency is a minimum of one year. PAIR residencies begin with a required half-day orientation session, which kicks off a four-month Research Phase. This Phase is a time for the artist and agency to establish mutual trust through shared exposure to each other’s work and process—the artist shadows agency staff and attends meetings, trainings and site visits, and in turn the agency hosts an artist talk and visits the artist at their studio. The Research Phase ends with the artist proposing a project, designed in collaboration with the partner agency, to produce during the remaining months of the residency.  

  

Following the Research Phase, the Implementation Phase of the residency is marked by approval of the project proposal and initiation of the work. The proposed project must be collaborative in nature and include at least one (1) public-facing event or component. Both DCLA and the partner agency will continue to provide the artist support during the project’s production for the duration of the residency.  

  

Throughout the residency, the artist, partner agency, and DCLA have weekly virtual or in-person check-in meetings to assist in project development.   

 

Artist Fee and Materials  

PAIR funding per residency is $40,000: $20,000 for the Research Phase and $20,000 for the Implementation Phase. All funds are paid directly to the artist, who is responsible for managing their own project budgets and submitting invoices on a timely basis. 

 

In addition to the $40,000, the artist receives: 

• A desk at the partner agency, with office access based on regular building hours 
• Access to materials/supplies at DCLA’s Materials for the Arts 

All applications must be submitted through Submittable

06/30/2025