residency intensive

Sibyls Shrine is a Network of Black artists who m/other in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania— and beyond. We have developed a multi-tiered residency approach to best meet the needs of each Sibyl wherever they are in their creative pursuits.

Scroll down to check out our current and past Residency Intensive Artists!

Each Residency Intensive Artist receives 6 months of radical care, rest and support including:

  • an unrestricted honorarium

  • a stipend for leading a virtual skill-share with Network Residents

  • a stipend towards materials, fabrication, shipping and insurance

  • monthly opportunities to be in dialogue with national arts professionals and practitioners

  • a culminating 3 month exhibition at one of our local or national partner organizations

  • a stipend for a post-exhibition artist panel

2024 Residency Intensive Artist

Melike Konur is a versatile and ethereal creative, soul singer, songwriter, and producer, gracefully navigating between mediums and sectors.

She calls both Northern Virginia and Istanbul home and her artistry is a testament to her devotion to maternal legacy and to The Divine.

Through her voice, lyrics, photography and movement she tells her story of possibility fused with a burgeoning unfolding of the mythology of her ancestral heritage. With an intricately woven storytelling style, Melike draws inspiration from the raw tapestry of nature, the flora and fauna, infusing her music with its mystique, merging conscious emancipation of the soul with the transcendent beauty of the lens of the multiracial Black Motherhood ceremony. 

Photo credit: Maria J. Hackett 

2023 Residency Intensive Artist

Photo credit: Emmai Alaquiva

Felicia Savage Friedman @ Atlantic Center for the Arts

“I am a Black, cis-gendered woman thriving amidst systems that don’t support me to live. My artistic practices are healing modalities.

As I feel, reveal, and heal, I commune with others through my embodied YogaRoots On Location AntiRacist Raja Yoga practice and The Cussin’ Yogini artwork. I creatively express myself through the written word, emoting on canvas, integrating aspects of my life through collage, or hosting anti-oppressive workshops.

I create to honor the people, places, and practices that root me into my humanity and connect me to the larger vision of collective liberation, centering unconditional love and joy above everything.”

- Felicia Savage Friedman (2022 - 2023 residency intensive artist)

2021 Residency Intensive Artist

Photo credit: Darrel Ellis.

Olivia Guterson @ Pittsburgh Playhouse

“Olivia Guterson is a Detroit-based transdisciplinary artist and mother who in her practice is thinking about brokenness, refusal, and fugitivity. She choreographs bones, shells, beads, soil, and colors into textures, gestures, rhythms, and offerings that challenge notions of her sense of becoming human as contained and fixed.