The Hammerspace Artist Cohort is a year-long program designed for emerging and mid-career artists, with a special focus on parent artists, who are seeking to grow their artistic practice and career in a sustainable, supportive, and community-driven way. The cohort consists of 6 artists who will receive monthly mentorship, opportunities for one solo and one group exhibition, and personalized support to help them prioritize their art career alongside their life as a parent.
meet the 2025 artist Cohort
Samantha Conrad-Vanranden
Samantha is a painter, educator, and live wedding artist based in Michigan. She earned her MFA in Painting from Kendall College of Art and Design and her BFA from Indiana University. Her work explores themes of motherhood and connection, often through the lens of traditional oil painting techniques blended with contemporary storytelling.
She teaches drawing at Grand Valley State University, where she fosters both technical skill and conceptual thinking in her students. In addition to her academic work, Samantha runs a live wedding painting business, creating heirloom-quality paintings that capture meaningful moments in real time.
As a mother of two children, Samantha’s creative practice is deeply informed by the rhythms of family life. Her studio is a space where artmaking and caregiving often coexist, and where the boundaries between the personal and professional are actively explored. She is particularly interested in how motherhood shapes identity and her creative voice.
Heather Duffy
Heather Duffy (b. 1983 Houston, TX) is an artist from the Mississippi Gulf Coast, currently living in Grand Rapids, MI. Duffy earned her MFA in painting from Kendall College of Art and Design and exhibits her studio work regionally and nationally. Before moving into full-time studio practice in 2024, she worked in non-profit leadership, as curator for the Urban Institue for Contemporary Arts, as exhibitions manager at ArtPrize, as a designer, and in academic and commercial art galleries. Since 2007 she has maintained a practice of independently curating, presenting exhibitions of contemporary art in Dallas, New York, Michigan, and throughout the American southeast.
melissa floyd
Melissa Beth Floyd’s paintings explore sexuality, aging, class, motherhood, and the male gaze. Centering on women, her figures navigate the psychological and physical tension between traditional expectations and contemporary identities. Through crude aesthetics and grotesque humor, Floyd challenges societal norms and personal mythologies, often disrupting the nostalgic ideal of 1950s suburban life and its rigid gender roles.
Her work has been exhibited internationally at Breach Miami, Jesus La Luz, Ox Bow House, BEERS Gallery (London), 19 Karen (Australia), and One Art (Taipei). She recently presented Now What, a solo exhibition at the Saginaw Art Museum. Floyd earned her Master of Fine Arts from Cranbrook Academy of Art and lives and works in Grand Rapids, MI.
helen hunter
Helen Hunter is a painter, specializing in oils. With a BA in history Lewis & Clark College and a BFA in drawing and painting from Pacific Northwest College of Art, her work is often influenced by historical motifs and research. Helen has developed an intuitive compositional method that involves drawing from her historical background, affinity for esoterica, and personal experiences with trauma, mental illness, and motherhood. Helen’s goal is to make work that speaks to others with shared physical and psychological experiences, fostering a sense of connection through exposing and engaging those elements of life often labeled “taboo.” Broadly, Helen’s work explores identity, anger, connection, and power, and pulls imagery from early human history, mythology, nature, and, of all things, pro-wrestling.
rebecca senior
Rebecca is based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Her work is inspired by the narratives of the communities she lives in. She primarily uses Acrylic, but embraces multimedia elements to add unexpected character to her paintings.
Rebecca’s narrative style comes from her love of reading and her foundation in scenic design. She credits theater with teaching her how to paint. For her patterns, she references the illustrative Art Nouveau tradition she first encountered in her childhood books and which continue to inspire her.
In 2019, Rebecca had her daughter, and her artistic practice changed dramatically. With less time, she was determined to create more intentionally. This practice helped her become enamored with the depth of ordinary life. Art was no longer a way to obsessively document life, as in her old sketchbooks, but a way to experience living. She continues to carry that sentiment with her in every piece she creates.
wendy withrow
Wendy Withrow creates art to process the experiences of daily life as a parent, partner, friend, neighbor, citizen, and steward. She wants people to relate her work to their own lives, recognize familiar emotions and experiences, and tap into a universal sense of the human experience. Her influences include contemporary dance, origami, and the ceramic arts. She gravitates toward artist books for their ability to combine words, texture, shapes, lines, and movement in time. An artist book can tackle global issues while offering an intimate, quiet experience.
Wendy earned a diploma in traditional bookbinding from the North Bennet Street School in Boston, Massachusetts. Before pursuing the book arts, she studied sculptural ceramics, graduating with a BFA in ceramic art from Grand Valley State University. In addition to exhibiting her artist books locally and nationally, she makes functional ceramics in a shared studio with her neighbor under the name Calkins Clayworks.