THE 100 WEST PROJECT 10 YEARS ON.

What began, among a group of artist friends in a huge three story former Odd Fellows Hall in Corsicana, Texas, as a sort of open question - What are we, as artists, doing here? - became, with only the faintest understanding as to how such things are done, an international invitation to that question. And right off the bat, 100 applicants from everywhere - Australia, Iceland, Germany. And then three times that number. Full-blown Residency. Yet keeping - somehow, in those airy, somewhat ghostly spaces occupied by no more than two artists and one writer at a time - that essential openness, that question and what some have termed a sense of ghostly freedom to pursue it, even out into the general community, whose history and whose history’s preservation has become a central concern and an extension of the 100W project.

What have we got here? is another question asked from time to time as things expand - a bookstore, gallery and new residential space. Kyle Hobratschk, founder and prime mover, seems pretty happy not to have to pin it down. But clearly more than just a residency. And still presenting that same open question with that open invitation to address it among friends in a little town out on the endless Texas openness where questions such as this, we feel, can gain a certain clarity.

David Searcy May, 2022

Video features founders and director Kyle Hobratschk, Travis LaMothe, Adrienne Lichliter-Hines, David Searcy, Nancy Rebal, and Corsicana Residency nonprofit board members Joe B. Brooks and Sally Warren. Composed and edited by former resident Trey Burns. Video funding support from the Corsicana Visitors' Bureau.