American Academy in Rome - The Rome Prize

American Academy in Rome
The Rome Prize

Important Application Information
Rome Prize Disciplines
Current Rome Prize Winners and Recent Winners
Current Rome Prize Juries and Recent Juries

Established in 1894 and chartered by an Act of Congress in 1905, the American Academy in Rome is a center that sustains independent artistic pursuits and humanistic studies. It is situated on the Janiculum, Rome's highest hill. Each year, through a national competition, the Rome Prize is awarded to 15 emerging artists (working in Architecture, Landscape Architecture, Design, Historic Preservation and Conservation, Literature, Musical Composition, or Visual Arts) and 15 scholars (working in Ancient, Medieval, Renaissance and ear Modern, or Modern Italian Studies). The application deadline is November 1st. The Academy community also includes invited Residents and international Affiliated Fellows.

Rome Prize fellowships are designed for emerging artists and for scholars in the early or middle stages of their careers. In the case of scholars, preference will be given to applicants for whom research time in Italy, and especially in the city of Rome, is essential, and who have not had extensive prior experience there. The Academy also offers a variety of opportunities for advanced scholars and artists. These include endowed residencies in the same fields as those in which the Rome Prize is awarded and a program for visiting artists and scholars.

From the outset the ideal of community has been fundamental to the American Academy in Rome. Fellowship winners come to Rome to refine and expand their own professional, artistic or scholarly aptitudes, drawing on their colleagues' erudition and experience, as well as on the inestimable resources of the Italian capital, Europe and the Mediterranean. The Academy offers the opportunity to examine firsthand the source of Western humanistic heritage, and to engage in a dialogue with Rome's culture. Time spent at the Academy - stimulated in part by varied walks, talks, tours and trips, a stream of distinguished international visitors and spontaneous table talk - allows residents to enter into informed discourse with this past and to draw upon it for their individual explorations.

The Academy's Rome Prize winners, the core of a residential community of up to 100 people at any given time, are at the center of a multi-disciplinary environment, where artists and scholars are encouraged to work collegially within and across disciplines. The scale of the Academy is small, which tends to help counteract the isolation that many experience during their creative careers. While everyone may not be suited to the Rome Prize experience, those who are will uncover lasting rewards.

The Academy's main building contains most of the studios, studies and residences of the Rome Prize winners, the Library, dining facilities and administrative offices, as well as exhibition galleries, communal spaces, a dark room and archaeology facilities. The Academy facilities also include extensive gardens and additional buildings.

The Academy gratefully acknowledges the National Endowment for the Humanities for its support of the Rome Prize competition.

Rome Prize Disciplines

Rome Prize Applications are accepted in the following fields:
(click on the discipline for application guidelines)

ARTS

*Awarded only by nomination through the American Academy of Arts and Letters

HUMANITIES