Visiting Artists and Scholars (VAVS) Program (spring session January 26 to June 15, 2026) - American Academy in Rome

Through the program, Visiting Artists and Scholars can rent living and working spaces at the Academy and join our vibrant community of Rome Prize winners, Italian Fellows, invited Residents, and global Affiliated Artists and Scholars. People in the following disciplines are encouraged to apply:

• ARTS: architecture, design, landscape architecture, literature, musical composition, and visual arts
• HUMANITIES: ancient studies, historic preservation and conservation, medieval studies, Renaissance and early modern studies, and modern Italian studies

As members of the community, Visiting Artists and Scholars are granted access to the Academy’s resources including the Library, the Photographic Archive, the Norton–Van Buren Study Collection, Bass Garden, the Cortile, and the many public spaces. They are invited to participate in our regular Walks and Talks program (subject to space and availability) as well as the internal and public programming of the Academy. As well, VAVS are invited to participate in the Rome Sustainable Food Project (lunch and dinner Monday through Friday) in the Academy dining room at an additional cost.

*** Please note that RSFP’s communal meals are created to be balanced and seasonal, emphasizing vegetables locally sourced from the Academy’s vegetable garden, regenerative farms and other organic suppliers. Meals are not a la carte.

Please write to vavsapplications@aarome.org for more information, or if you have questions about the application process.

Sessions

Please note that, starting from Academic Year 2025–26, the Visiting Artists & Scholars Program of the American Academy in Rome will be divided into TWO SESSIONS.

Spring Session: Arrivals from January 26 to June 15, 2026. The application portal will open on June 24, 2025. The application deadline is October 31, 2025.

Applications are reviewed in Rome by a committee led by the Director of the American Academy in Rome. You will be notified of the status of your application within six weeks of the closing deadline.

About us 

The American Academy in Rome awards the Rome Prize to a select group of artists and scholars, after an application process that begins in the fall of each year. The winners, announced in the spring, are invited to Rome to pursue their work in an atmosphere conducive to intellectual and artistic freedom, interdisciplinary exchange, and innovation.

The encounter with Rome represents now, as it has done since the Academy’s inception, something unique: a chance for American artists and scholars to spend significant time interacting and working in one of the oldest, most cosmopolitan cities in the world. The richness of Rome’s artistic and cultural legacy and its power to stimulate creative thinking served as the initial impetus for the Academy’s founding. Today, those tendencies live on, transformed as ever by the dynamism of the Academy’s constantly evolving community. The community includes Fellows, Residents, Visiting Artists and Scholars, and, come June, members of academic Summer Programs.