The American Academy in Rome (AAR) announced today the winners of the 2023–24 Rome Prize and Italian Fellowships. These highly competitive fellowships support advanced independent work and research in the arts and humanities.

This year, the Rome Prize—the gift of “time and space to think and work”—was awarded to 36 American artists and scholars, who will each receive a stipend, workspace, and room and board at the Academy’s eleven-acre campus on the Janiculum Hill in Rome, starting in September 2023.

“This class of Rome Prize winners once again includes some of America’s most gifted scholars and artists,” said Mark Robbins, President and CEO. “Their fellowship experience, living and working in a multidisciplinary community in Rome, has an enduring impact individually and on the wider intellectual and cultural sphere.”

Rome Prize winners are selected annually by independent juries of distinguished artists and scholars through a highly competitive national competition. The eleven disciplines supported by the Academy are: ancient studies, architecture, design, historic preservation and conservation, landscape architecture, literature, medieval studies, modern Italian studies, music composition, Renaissance and early modern studies, and visual arts.

This year’s competition received 988 submissions from applicants in 44 states, Washington, DC, Puerto Rico, and 4 different countries. The acceptance rate was 3.6 percent. This group of Rome Prize winners is among the most diverse in the Academy’s history: approximately 50 percent identify as persons of color, representing a new high for this demographic. Eleven percent were born outside the United States. The incoming class ranges from 28 to 68 years old, with an average age of 41. This year AAR awarded the inaugural Tsao Family Rome Prize, which supports humanities research in the history of ideas and cultural exchange between the East and West.

The Academy also announced three Italian Fellowships, through which Italian artists and scholars join the AAR community and pursue their own projects in a collaborative environment with their American counterparts. The Italian Fellows are also selected through a national jury process. AAR additionally announced the winner of the Terra Foundation Affiliated Fellowship for a Chicago-Based Visual Artist.

The Rome Prize and Italian Fellowship winners will be presented in person during the annual Arthur and Janet C. Ross Rome Prize Ceremony, taking place in the Great Hall at Cooper Union in New York on Monday, April 24 at 6:30pm. The ceremony will also feature a conversation between the acclaimed artist Carrie Mae Weems (2006 Fellow) and AAR President Mark Robbins (1997 Fellow).

American Academy in Rome

Established in 1894, the American Academy in Rome (AAR) is America’s oldest overseas center for independent studies and advanced research in the arts and humanities. The Academy has since evolved to become a more global and diverse base for artists and scholars to live and work in Rome. The residential community includes a wide range of scholarly and artistic disciplines, which is representative of the United States and is fully engaged with Italy and contemporary international exchange. The support provided by the Academy to Rome Prize and Italian Fellows, and invited Residents, helps strengthen the arts and humanities.

To learn more about the American Academy in Rome, please visit www.aarome.org.