Columbus Art Museum names A.J. Verdelle as 2024 Aminah Robinson Writing Resident
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A.J. Verdelle, a novelist and associate professor of English and Language Arts at Morgan State University in Baltimore, has been named the 2024 Aminah Robinson Writing Resident by the Columbus Museum of Art.
Established in 2022, the annual residency supports African American writers, scholars and researchers in memory of Robinson’s deep research and writing practices. It is one of three residency and fellowship programs within the Aminah Robinson Legacy Project, which was created by the Columbus Museum of Art in 2020 to pay homage to Robinson’s immense creative contributions and further her legacy.
In addition to a $15,000 cash award, Verdelle, who previously taught at Lesley University and Princeton University, will spend three months in Robinson’s renovated home studio on the Near East Side, which the late artist left to the museum following her death in 2015. The museum spent $200,000 to restore the house for working artists.
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During her residency, Verdelle will be working on her forthcoming novel, “Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch,” which focuses on Black cowboys in the American West. This is her third book, following “The Good Negress” (1996), a coming-of-age tale of a young woman in 1960s Detroit, and “Miss Chloe” (2022), a memoir detailing Verdelle’s friendship with noted author Toni Morrison, with whom she worked at Princeton.
Verdelle was selected by a jury of scholars and writing professionals including Allie Martin, 2023 Aminah Robinson Artist in Residence and an assistant professor at Dartmouth College; Sally Crane Cox, publisher, journalist and cofounder of Matriots Ohio; Scott Woods, author, poet, and founder of Streetlight Guild; and Treva Lindsey, author and a professor at The Ohio State University.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Art museum names A.J. Verdelle as Aminah Robinson Writing Resident
