Author: Rachael Mayer
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In 2025, we launched our inaugural Artist in Residence (AiR) program at the Surface Design Association (SDA). Designed for early, mid-career, and established fiber artists, this program helps build skills, leverage relationships, and guide studio projects that promote artistic growth. Held virtually from October to August, SDA’s Artist in Residence program removes barriers, allowing artists who can’t attend an in-person residency the opportunity to participate.
From hundreds of outstanding applications from the SDA community last year, we proudly selected Meli Bandera (they/them) as our inaugural AiR. Meli is a Chicana multi-disciplinary artist, curator, and educator based in the Midwest. Their work focuses on the interaction of ancestral fiber techniques and contemporary practices, such as Chicano tattoo traditions, to investigate cultural shifts and the ways migration and place shape cultural identity. Through black and gray linework, bold saturated color, and story-driven narrative, Meli explores Mexican and Catholic histories as well as family legacy. We learned more about Meli’s inspiration and what drives them to create work in their artist talk during our 2026 symposium, Fiber & Form: Tactile Acts of Threading Space.
SDA’s Artist in Residence program aims to weave our AiR into all areas of SDA. In this way we can leverage the unique knowledge base of staff and committee members to help the AiR refine skills that they can use beyond the residency. Throughout 2025 and into 2026, Meli has become integral to SDA, presenting at our symposium, hosting a series of Zoom meetups digging in to the history and use of cochineal, participating inTextile Talks, and serving as guest juror for our annual Exhibition in Print: Memory and Myth, published in the Surface Design Journal.
SDA strives to create a lasting community through genuine connection and support of fiber arts. Each AiR has the opportunity to design programming that aligns with their skills and interests and receives $2,000 in compensation for these activities. Additionally, we provide a $2,000 stipend to support studio work during their residency, bringing the total they receive to $4,000. We are grateful to the Lenore G. Tawney Foundation for their support in making this programming possible. Our application for the 2026-2027 residency is open until August 14, 2026 and while there is no application fee, you do need to be a member of SDA to apply. We can’t wait to see the ways in which this residency shifts and changes as each AiR leaves their mark on the program and SDA.
Rachael Mayer (she/her) is a visual artist and Assistant Director of the Surface Design Association (SDA). With a BA in Anthropology and Ethnic Studies and an MFA in Studio Art, Rachael bridges her two areas of study by designing programming inspired by and with community. Pulling on long threads of ancestral knowledge and learned skills in academic spaces, she reimagines the ways in which we gather (both online and in person) and provides the support to make it happen.
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