Art Residencies – MaréMotrice

Summer 2027 residency: East coast of Greenland, departing from Iceland

When: July 26 to August 18

Where: departure and arrival at Isafjordur, Iceland

Approximate itinerary: Isafjordur — crossing to Greenland in a few days — Tasiilaq – Tiniteqilaak – Kûngmiut – Isafjordur

Who: 4 artists + skipper

Selection: Send an email to benjamin@maremotrice.ch before November 1, 2026: a few lines introducing yourself and explaining your project. Artists are no longer selected based on classic application materials, but following a video call.

Priority Projects: For this polar residency, we would ideally like to host a collaborative project among the four artists, with a specific plan for showcasing the resulting work. If you don’t know which artists to collaborate with, MaréMotrice can help connect you with them. If you’re planning to work solo, please write to us anyway, or consider the mini Icelandic residency option.

Funding: The residency costs 4,200 CHF (Swiss francs) per artist, plus a contribution to the common fund (which we use for groceries and to cover any shipping fees, etc.) of approximately 500 CHF per person. We are not handling fundraising this year. We simply don’t have the time. MaréMotrice should be viewed as a fantastic logistical platform dedicated to the arts, not as an institution that provides financial assistance.

A question? Just ask: benjamin@maremotrice.ch

HORNSTRANDIR Mini Residency, Iceland

In addition to our usual trip, we also want to plan a shorter trip to the stunning Hornstrandir Nature Reserve in northwestern Iceland. It’s not a polar expedition in the strict sense, but this northwestern peninsula of Iceland is breathtakingly beautiful, wild, accessible only by boat, and usually teeming with whales.

When: July 15-22th 2027

Where: Departure and arrival at Isafjordur, Iceland

Approximate itinerary: Coastal voyage around Iceland’s Northwest Peninsula

Who: 4 artists + skipper

Selection: Send an email to benjamin@maremotrice.ch before October 1, 2026: a few lines introducing yourself and explaining your project. Artists are no longer selected based on classic application materials, but following a video call.

Priority Projects: There are no preferences regarding the type of artistic project proposed. Work may be done individually or/and collectively.

Funding: The mini-residency costs 1,200 CHF (Swiss francs) per artist, plus a cash box (which we use for groceries and to cover any shipping fees, etc.) of approximately 250 CHF per person. We are not handling fundraising this year. We simply don’t have the time. MaréMotrice should be viewed as a fantastic logistical platform dedicated to the arts, not as an institution that provides financial assistance.

A question? Just ask: benjamin@maremotrice.ch

Taking artists to the sea, to islands or around icebergs has a particularity: it is their job to feel the place and what happens there, it is their job to transmit what they see and experience, on a sensory and emotional level.

Azores residency : September 28 – October 13 2026 / Fully booked

Azores – Canary Artistic Traverse : October 19 – November 3 / Ocean passage / Organization in process

2027 polar residency: East coast of Greenland, departing from Iceland. Open call will be sent out via our newsletter and through insta next fall.

Contact: benjamin@maremotrice.ch

Since 2016, non-profit MaréMotrice has been organizing artist residencies on board a 15-meter expedition sailboat. The proposed approach consists in confronting different perspectives on the polar regions. These trips take place collectively, four artists and one or two crew members live and work for three to four weeks on a few square metres.

For an artists’ laboratory on the high seas

Have you ever been told about the quality of light up there at the pole? Have you ever been described the sound of ice cubes hitting each other in the mist? And the color of an overturned iceberg, how is that? There is an urgent need to interpret and note this: when everything is transformed, who will tell us about it?

We intend to carry out a real subjective documentation work on the changing polar regions. There is a fair amount of scientific data on global warming, ice melting, the evolution of polar fauna, but very few artistic traces are organized.

It is through the eyes of artists, with multiple languages, that we want to print and engrave these images. Artists whose work challenges us, whom we wish to take to sea, from one iceberg to another. Creators who will surprise us and make us dream by immersing ourselves in the places that are so dear to us.

By organizing these expeditions, the association aims to document climate change in the ocean and polar regions and to take a look at the human communities living near the poles. All this by inviting on board a diversity of perspectives and means of expression: filmmakers, visual artists, illustrators, painters, photographers, engravers, writers, etc.

MaréMotrice organizes one or two residencies per summer, lasting three to four weeks. Funding is provided partly by the association when it obtains grants, and partly by the artists -who must seek for funding by themselves. The 2025 residency is on the tracks. Deadline for application: october 1st 2024

Contact benjamin@maremotrice.ch / +33 7 847 280 42