Artists in Residence

Nicole Acosta is our 14th Pfister Artist in Residence. She is a proud first-generation Mexican-American and Milwaukee-based visual artist, storyteller, and photographer. Nicole's current project, HOOPS, is gaining national recognition for its representation of Latinx roots, rituals, and spirituality.

Christopher T Wood is our thirteenth Pfister Artist-in-Residence. He is a Milwaukee-based artist working in the realm of pataphysical illustration. By applying unique processes, he has developed over time, Wood creates drawings consisting of powdered graphite and exquisite shading that form distinct creations.

Nykoli Koslow is our twelfth Pfister Artist-in-Residence. He is a Milwaukee-based artist working in the realm of painting and drawing. Nykoli fuses figuration with abstraction to explore notions of gender, sexuality, and agency. Part autobiographical and part research-based; his work as Pfister Artist in Residence anchors the innate Trans experience into a queer mythic cosmology. His work pulls from ancient history, mythology, religion, mysticism, and a kind of theoretical physics infused with sci-fi.

Stephanie Schultz is a fashion designer specializing in historically-inspired couture. Schultz’s work is often inspired by antique art and architecture, making The Pfister Hotel a perfect fit for her next collection. As an artist, she is no stranger to exploring new styles and designs. Her work has transitioned from counter-culture streetwear to couture and avant-garde. In 2005, Schultz began her fashion label, Silversärk, as a way to bring Japanese street fashion to a Western audience. Recently, she has experimented with fashion elements from the Tudor-era through the Roaring ’20s, and translated them into contemporary designs. Through her passion and dedication for fashion design, Schultz has unveiled a number of different lines and collections under Silversärk.

As part of her residency and as an homage to The Pfister Hotel’s invaluable Victorian art collection, Schultz spent her yearlong residency designing a fashion line inspired by the subjects in the hotel’s expansive art collection. In addition, she created wearable art from photos taken around the hotel and digitally printed onto fabric, to encourage guests to take a piece of the Pfister with them. Her residency culminated in a fashion show, presenting the full collection in The Pfister Hotel’s Imperial Ballroom. The final piece of her collection serves as a Legacy Piece for the hotel, which is on permanent display in the property.

Muza, a Milwaukee-area tintype photographer, began working in the hotel’s lobby-level Artist’s Studio for one year beginning April 1, 2017. For only the second time in the history of the Artist-in-Residence program, Muza was also selected as the winner of the public vote.

“My love of history made me familiar with tintypes. The beauty of older portraits such as Abraham Lincoln, Fredrick Douglass and others moved me and I fell in love with the process. I am eager to begin interacting with hotel guests and teaching them the inner workings of tintype photography. As part of my work in the studio, I will be able to capture memorable moments as they happen and give guests their own unique tintype portrait only a few minutes after the picture is taken. I look forward to capturing the many faces of guests and associates and telling their story through my work.”

Pamela Anderson began working in the downtown Milwaukee hotel’s lobby-level Artist’s Studio beginning April 2016. As the eighth Pfister Artist in Residence, Anderson, who studied at Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, created two series of works: “Gilded,” 8-10 pieces based on the gilded structures, furniture and Victorian pieces located in The Pfister Hotel, and “Architecture,” 8-10 pieces based on the structures of building. Her process utilizes large mops, tools and huge brushes to puddle, drip and scrape the surfaces of her work.

Todd Mrozinski is an artist, curator, and teacher. He graduated from Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design in 1997, has been in solo and group exhibitions nationwide, and has work in various public and private collections. He is the seventh Pfister Artist-in-Residence.
During his residency, he created a “Light from The Pfister” series, which focused on the hotel’s guests and the light that illuminates them.
Todd and his wife Renee have a studio in The Nut Factory, Riverwest, WI, where they offer art classes and workshops. He is currently represented by Woodman/Shimko Gallery, Palm Springs, CA.

Niki Johnson is an interdisciplinary artist, organizer, and educator. She was the sixth Pfister Artist-in-Residence. Johnson has taught two discussion sections for the Foundations Department in Contemporary Art History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, as well as several classes at the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design, including Foundry, Advanced Mold-Making and Casting, 3D Design, and 2D Glassworks. She also participates in speaking engagements through the National Council for Education in the Ceramic Arts and is a blogger for the Huffington Post.

Stephanie Barenz is a painter, printmaker, and architecture lover from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Her work is created with the hope that it would stimulate a conversation about the sanctity of knowing one's neighbor, the importance of locality, and the elevation of the commonplace to the remarkable.

“The Pfister is the perfect stage for my work, which deals with how travel affects one’s relationship to place,” said Barenz. “The hotel carries thousands of stories from over a hundred years. The Victorian art collection, the antiques, and spaces have served as silent witnesses to all of it.”

“Over the course of the year, I plan to create a body of work that will include 20 to 30 paintings. Images of these paintings will be turned into a book and I plan to collaborate with the Pfister Narrator, the hotel’s writer in residence, to write text for the images. I am so looking forward to moving into the studio, starting my project, and getting to know more of the Milwaukee community through my platform at The Pfister.”

Barenz primarily paints and draws on wood panels using a range of media, including acrylics, sumi ink, and pencil. A Milwaukee-area resident for the past two years, she currently works as a full-time artist at Plaid Tuba, the studio of The Pfister’s first Artist in Residence, Reginald Baylor. With extensive experience teaching and studying art, Barenz has taught in Southeast China, studied in Florence, Italy, and completed a one-year residency at the Chicago Printmakers Collaborative. She graduated from Washington University in St. Louis, Mo., with a Master of Fine Arts degree.

Barenz was one of six finalists included in the public voting period. In addition to the public vote via Facebook, Twitter, and in-person ballots, a selection committee, consisting of leaders in the local art community, made the final decision in choosing the next artist in residence.

The Pfister’s selection committee has chosen Timothy Westbrook, an emerging fiber artist from New York, as its fourth artist in residence. He will move to Milwaukee for this opportunity and will work in The Pfister’s studio space beginning in April 2012 and remain at the hotel for one year.

“Drawn to The Pfister by the artistic and historical reputation of Milwaukee, I am honored by the invitation to spend a year developing my artistic voice in this unique setting,” says Westbrook. “While at The Pfister, I plan to weave cloth out of various organic and repurposed manmade materials, including items like cassette tapes, sculpting them into costumes and fashion while pulling from the inspiration of the hotel and the Victorian Decorative Arts period. I am excited to watch my weaving and costumes evolve under the inspiration of the artistic energy in Milwaukee and in the hotel.”

A recent graduate from Syracuse University in Syracuse, NY, Westbrook is a fiber artist who focuses on costume, performance, and installation art. He uses fairytale themes as an environmentalist analogy. He implements his sustainable studio practices by using re-purposed materials for his work along with low-impact equipment; his favorite is a non-electric treadle sewing machine.

“We’re thrilled to welcome our first out-of-state artist to the program,” says Joe Kurth, general manager of The Pfister Hotel. “The program has been gaining national attention in the last couple of years and we’re proud it has attracted talent like Timothy’s. Selected through the juried panel process based on his impressive skill, engaging personality, and unique point of view, we’re eager to introduce him and his work to our guests.”

Westbrook was one of six finalists included in the public voting period, which ended last week. In addition to the public vote via Facebook, Twitter, and in-person ballots, a selection committee, consisting of leaders in the local art community, made the final decision in choosing the next artist in residence.

Shelby Keefe is a contemporary impressionistic painter, teacher, and performance artist. Born in Whitewater, WI in 1958, she graduated in 1981 from Cardinal Stritch University in Milwaukee, WI. After retiring from a career in graphic design in 2005, she operates her own art studio and exhibition space in Bay View, on the south side of Milwaukee.

Her award-winning urban landscape paintings have earned her participation in prestigious nation juried shows, plein air painting competitions, and arts festivals as well as gaming commission work for a variety of corporate clients and private collectors. Her oil paintings are found in collections such as The Bradley Foundation, Acuity, Northwestern Mutual, Ozaukee Country Club, WE Energies, University School of Milwaukee; and other businesses around Milwaukee, and private collections in Wisconsin and around the country.

Katie uses painting as her way of documenting small pockets of the population around her. She attempts to insert herself into places where artists aren't usually found in order to discover interesting people to paint, as well as to expose the surrounding community to the act of art-making. "I've painted at the Wilson Commons in South Milwaukee and the St. Ann Center in St. Francis. I'd show up every week and paint a single person for everyone to watch, observe and interact with. My goal is to blur the lines between 'us' and 'them' by taking regular people and elevating them to a subject worthy of being painted, shown in a gallery or museum, seen by 'art educated people' and mixing them together until you can't tell who is who."

Local artist Reginald Baylor, who works with acrylic on canvas, was named the hotel’s first Resident Artist. In this capacity, he spent a significant amount of his workweek and weekends in the hotel studio working on large-scale, linear paintings, which he sells throughout the country for tens of thousands of dollars.

Reginald Baylor was born November 1966 in Milwaukee, WI. He attended the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh majoring in fine art and art education with an emphasis in sculpture. After college, Reginald relocated to Southern California where he was married to his wife, Jill, and worked for the Laguna Beach Art Museum and Newport Beach Art Museum.

In 1995, Reginald and his wife and two sons moved to Chicago, IL. There he began a career as an owner-operator for Mason Dixon Trucking while continuing to produce original artwork. He returned to the Milwaukee area with his family in 1998 and owns a studio in downtown Milwaukee in the Third Ward – Marshall Building. He is represented by Suzanne Zada of Beverly Hills, CA, and Racquel Chevremont of New York, NY.