P.R.O.O.F. Fellowship
2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellows
Print Residency of Ohio’s Future
Artistic Development.
Personal Growth.
Bold Comradery.
The Print Residency Of Ohio’s Future (P.R.O.O.F.) Fellowship is a 6-month fine art printmaking residency for Northeast Ohio Artists from historically underrepresented communities, inspired by Zygote’s 2021-2023 BIPOC Fellowship artists-in-residence.
By Kalia Horner / 2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellow
The P.R.O.O.F. Fellowship offers non-printmaking artists from BIPOC communities an opportunity to learn a variety of printmaking techniques including silkscreen, monoprint, relief, intaglio, lithography and RISO.
P.R.O.O.F. Fellows are introduced to both contemporary and traditional printmaking techniques through a series of workshops led by Zygote Press teaching artists and former fellowship recipients. For the duration of the fellowship program, selected artists have 24/7 access to Zygote’s Printmaking Studio. Zygote also offers mentoring sessions and peer critiques for fellows to hone their craft, discuss their work and focus their artistic research toward their individual goals.
By Arfil Pajarillaga / 2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellow
Residency Benefits
22 hours of printmaking workshop instruction ($2,500)
10 hours of individual printmaking support ($500)
Year-long Zygote Press annual membership + associated perks
6 months of 24/7 access to Zygote’s printmaking studio ($960)
Locker and flat file for the duration of the fellowship
$500.00 Stipend
Participation in the 2026 PROOF Fellowship Exhibition
Exhibition and installation support.
The selected artists will be introduced to both contemporary and traditional printmaking techniques through a series of workshops led by Zygote Press teaching artists and former PROOF Fellows. The workshop sessions will be scheduled on Saturday mornings.
Additionally, PROOF Fellows will have ongoing 24/7 access to Zygote’s Printmaking Studio for the duration of the fellowship. Zygote will also host mentoring sessions and peer critiques for Fellows to hone their printmaking craft, talk about their work and focus their artistic research.
Sample Schedule
Click here to preview a sample schedule based on the 2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellowship.
Applications
Applications for the 2026-2027 P.R.O.O.F. Fellowship are now closed. Please check back next year for the 2027-2028 application cycle.
Applications are reviewed annually by a committee of independent artists and educators from similar communities. The committee selects six Northeast Ohio local artists to participate in Zygote’s P.R.O.O.F. Fellowship Cohort
All application materials below must be in a single PDF file no larger than 10MB.
To apply, email the following materials to elyseherrera@zygotepress.org:
(1) Letter of interest/project proposal (500 word limit)
(2) A portfolio of recent work (10-20 images)
(3) Short Bio (one paragraph limit)
(4) Artist Statement
(5) Resume or CV
Current P.R.O.O.F. Fellows
Arfil Pajarillaga
2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellow
Arfil Pajarillaga is a Filipino American multidisciplinary artist born in American Samoa and currently based in Cleveland, OH. His practice focuses on primarily using analog photography processes to examine the relationship dynamics within environments, using the act of framing as a way to make meaning of the world around him. His work has been published and exhibited throughout Ohio, and has most recently been awarded the 2025 Property Inventory residency at Cleveland Print Room.
Briana Robinson
2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellow
Hi! I'm Briana, a Cleveland native and a multidisciplinary artist. I earned my degree in Visual Communication Design from Kent State University, where I explored various artistic techniques and mediums. Since graduating, I've gained experience as a graphic and web designer in the marketing field, creating impactful visuals that tell compelling stories.
Erykah Townsend
2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellow
Erykah Townsend, also known as E.T., is a conceptual artist based in Cleveland, Ohio. Her art boldly confronts and questions the role of pop culture in our lives. Townsend uses pop culture as a medium to explore the spaces it occupies in our lives and to inquire about the nature of the imaginary.
Jazzee Rozier
2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellow
Jazzee Rozier is a 22-year-old mixed media artist with a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts degree in drawing. Rozier spends a lot of their time researching and reiterating philosophical ideas on coping with emotions, relationships, and overall surviving on a daily basis. They take a lot of inspiration from their surroundings and the people they interact with; taking walks, listening to music, and keeping an active sketchbook act as key components to this inside creative process. Considering a familial theme and broad ideas of separation/individualism, tragic optimism, and documentation, Rozier implements printmaking, drawing, sewing, written poetry, and photography as chosen techniques to display this angst.
As an artist who spends a lot of time practicing existing within communities and actively showing up for them, Rozier showcases a lot of their artworks within various art galleries, exhibitions, and even curating shows for the involvement of others. One way or another, the drive behind their studio practice is strongly rooted in any means of including the world that keeps moving outside of their own personal experience. Being present matters.
Kalia Horner
2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellow
Kalia Horner is a Hmong-American artist based in Northeast Ohio who pulls inspiration from her multicultural background, creating powerful figurative paintings exploring her cultural heritage as well as sexuality. While also exploring multiple disciplines in her work, she executes touches of printmaking and textile collage throughout her large scaled works. She has exhibited several solo and group shows throughout Northeast Ohio during her undergraduate degree in Painting and Drawing.
While also obtaining a BA in Art Education, she teaches art disciplines to K-7 students in public schools, while also continuing her fine arts studies. Using a variety of materials in her work, she culminates strong imagery within her paintings and ties together her personal expression and relationships to identity, family, culture, gender roles and sexuality.
Monique Biggers
2025-2026 P.R.O.O.F. Fellow
Monique is an abstract visual artist guided by curiosity, intuition, and the shifting relationship between body, spirit, and environment. While acrylic serves as a foundation, her practice often incorporates found and repurposed materials that embrace imperfection, experimentation, and attention to process.
For Monique, creating is a somatic meditation, a tactile form of listening and emotional processing. Her work is deeply informed by the natural world, drawing from its cycles of impermanence and renewal. Through layered textures and evolving forms, they invite viewers into moments of stillness and reflection offering space to reconnect with emotion, embrace uncertainty, and move with the organic rhythms of change.
Former P.R.O.O.F. Fellows
2024 P.R.O.O.F. Fellowship
May-December 2024
BIPOC Fellowship Program (Retired)
Between 2021 and 2023, Zygote Press annually offered six paid residency seats to local Black, Indigenous, and People of Color art educators, artists, or creatives for our BIPOC Fellowship.
The objective of the BIPOC Fellowship program is to provide artists from BIPOC communities with an opportunity to learn a variety of print techniques, including silkscreen, monoprint, relief, and RISO. Residency applicants should demonstrate an interest in sharing their knowledge with other artists through educational programming.
This program is for BIPOC artists or creatives in Northeast Ohio, who have little or no experience in printmaking and preferably some experience working in the education sector, as well as established educators and artists serving or have interest in serving the BIPOC community.