News Release: 2/5/2025

For Immediate Release: 2025 Scherbarth Residents Announced at Shake Rag Alley Center for the Arts

Photos attached:

• 2025Scherbarth pics
• 2024 Scherbarth talk

MINERAL POINT, Wis.—Shake Rag Alley Center for the Arts is pleased to announce the 2025 lineup of artists-in-residence selected for the Scherbarth Residency Program: writer, mixed media, and movement artist Penelope Cake; Madison-based painter and creative Katie Hogan; and community-taught mixed media artist Meghan Rosing. Throughout February and March, these artists will be visiting Mineral Point to continue their practice and engage with the community.

The two-week Scherbarth Residency is competitively awarded to artists and makers in the visual, performing, and literary arts who seek to share their work in a public forum and contribute stewardship hours to the Shake Rag Alley campus while working on a project. Shake Rag Alley provides lodging, studio space, and opportunities to connect with Shake Rag Alley’s creative community. 

In late February, Penelope Cake will be visiting from Cape May, New Jersey to continue work on her book in progress The Library Project. With a BA in dance from Bennington College, and graduate course work at Bank St. School of Education, NYC, she continues to follow her creative impulses in everything she does and believes wholeheartedly in inspiring a creative life for others. While in residence, she will be offering a public program through the Mineral Point Public Library. Cake inhabits the library, observing its character, and paying close attention to her experiences. In her writing, she tries to capture the authenticity of the place and people.

At the end of March, Katie Hogan and Meghan Rosing will be in residence. Katie Hogan explores human portraiture and the figure, working in oils, unconventional surfaces, and mixed media. She has been an active member of the Atwood Atelier School & Studio for the past five years, and currently works as the Gallery Manager at the Art Hub in Cambridge WI, a community-focused gallery and art education space. Hogan plans to paint and draw the people of Mineral Point from life as a way to build connection through shared experience.

Rooted in the practice of reusing and remaking materials, Meghan Rosing’s childhood experiences of collaborative art-making encouraged her to regard the people around her as fellow artists and to see the whole world as ripe with materials ready to be used for projects. As a community-taught artist, she is inspired by folk and “outsider” art, especially artist-created environments. During her time in Mineral Point, she’ll continue work on her portrait series “A Woman’s Work Is Never Done,” which includes images of headline-grabbing women like Lizzie Borden, Olive Oatman, Saint Bernadette, Typhoid Mary, and the Dionne Quintuplets. Some of these women are famous as perpetrators of shameful deeds while others are victims of violence and kidnap, or are celebrated merely by accident of their birth. 

Through the generosity of the late Jim Scherbarth who endowed the program, artists and makers will have access to the time and space needed to work and create, as well as to the nurturing environment of Mineral Point and the chance to interact with its network of resident artists. While living on the unique campus of historic and reproduction buildings, Scherbarth residents contribute in meaningful ways to the mission of Shake Rag Alley. Meanwhile, members of the public benefit from the special access they have to the artists through public events, with opportunities to interact one-on-one and to gain inspiration from the artists’ experience and process. 

More information available at https://shakeragalley.org/scherbarth-residency/

Upcoming Events at Shake Rag Alley

Winter Writers Reading Series Events | March
We're continuing to host winning writers from Wisconsin People & Ideas, Arts + Literature Laboratory, and the Wisconsin Writers Association as part of the Winter Writers Reading Series. Writers spend a week at Shake Rag Alley Center for the Arts and participate in community outreach. In March we have upcoming readings Thursdays at 6 p.m. with Patty Cisneros Prevo (March 6 via Zoom), and Bob Wake (March 13) and Katharine Beutner and Emma Binder (March 20) at Republic of Letters Books. 

Driftless Poets Workshop | March 12
Local and aspiring poets are invited to the monthly Driftless Poets workshop at 2 p.m. March 12. The purpose of the group is to provide support and encouragement for serious or aspiring poets seeking honest feedback on their work. Free (donations welcome!); register at www.ShakeRagAlley.org or call the office to receive the Zoom link. For more information and updates throughout the year, see www.ShakeRagAlley.org, call (608) 987-3292, subscribe to twice-monthly e-newsletters and follow Shake Rag Alley on Facebook andInstagram.

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About Shake Rag Alley Center for the Arts

A nonprofit school of arts and crafts founded in 2004 by local artists and community members, Shake Rag Alley’s 2.5-acre campus at 18 Shake Rag St. in Mineral Point (population 2,500) is a national destination for participants of adult workshops, a robust summer youth program and a host of annual special events. In addition, Shake Rag offers on-site lodging and custom facility rentals for meetings, events and celebrations. For additional information about Shake Rag Alley’s workshops and events, or to request a catalog and information about facility rentals and volunteer opportunities, see www.ShakeRagAlley.org or call (608) 987-3292.