Walter and Sarah Knestrick Award Empowers Young Creatives

Meet the young Nashville artists getting a headstart on their careers with Knestrick Award funding

Each spring, the Watkins College of Art hosts the Annual Student Exhibition (ASE) where student art is displayed, a jury of professionals examine student work and awards are given. Standing out from the various character and craft-based awards are several notable scholarships, such as the Walter and Sarah Knestrick Award which provides recipients with a $5,000 grant to pursue a creative project. 

Making History at Watkins 

This year's ASE marked a first for the prestigious award. With three recipients and a total of $15,000 in support of student projects, the impact of the Knestrick Award has tripled. “Since the beginning, I’ve hoped that I’ll need to ask the Knestricks for extra money each year because there are so many great proposals,” said James Pierce, dean of Watkins. “This year, that’s exactly what happened.” 

Benjamin Bradley, Janelle Hagan and Naomi Miles all received the award, making this the first year with more than two recipients. “I was so incredibly excited and honored,” said Miles. “To put everything you have into a project, and to learn that your mentors and people you have never met have the same faith in that project, felt so overwhelmingly lovely.” 

Each recipient will complete separate projects, bolstered by Watkins’ creative community. “One of the things I'm most excited about is the incoming dialogue and collaboration that I see as essential to art making,” mused Bradley. “Creativity is collaborative, and this project would not be what it is without the advice and support I've gotten from my fellow students and faculty.”  

“I feel like I am finally finding my voice as an artist and making work that means something to me, excites me, and reveals the purpose of my practice," added Hagan. 

Once the projects are finished, the awardees will return to campus to show their final work. These events have taken on many forms over the years, from lecture-based presentations to full on gallery shows, and it’sup to each artist to determine the best way to deliver their concept. 

Jolie’s Story 

How the Knestrick Award Kickstarted Her Career 

The only other year with multiple recipients was 2024, when Watkins alumna Zoe Nichols and Jolie Monet both received the grant. Monet, now a freelance photographer, remembers this as the fertile soil from which her professional career and artistic journey bloomed. “My Knestrick project gave me a form of photography that I’m eager to continue exploring: documentary and photojournalism,” she said. 

The process of executing her project built skills well beyond artmaking. From budgeting to writing a grant proposal to pursuing and receiving gallery space, the project required Monet to interact with the business side of art in ways that she hadn’t before. “I learned that beauty is expensive,” she laughed. 

Monet’s photographic practice is one of empathetic portraiture, influenced by the Swiss photographer Robert Frank. Photographing individuals on the fringes, she seeks to “add to the conversation in a way that brings out nuance,” and encourages the viewer to consider the subjects in new ways.  

Monet first became interested in this approach after being exposed to Frank’s 1959 photobook “The Americans” by assistant professor of art history Tom Williams. “If it weren't for Tom’s class, I never would have fallen in love with photography as art, or discovered the conversations brought about through the lens.” 

Now photographing in a professional setting, Monet regularly employs the human-centric attitude she developed through the project. “In my work with the Nashville Business Journal, I’m using photojournalism to capture subjects in a way that tells their stories better,” she shared. This growth, coupled with her upcoming projects, sets Monet up to be a photographer of significant impact in the Nashville art scene. 

Nashville’s Next Wave of Artists 

Recipients of the Knestrick Award contribute to a vibrant legacy of creative potential. From its inception in 2022 to the ambition seen in this year’s triple win, the cyclical nature of the grant draws winners into a network of young alumni who provide each other with peer mentorship and like-minded community.