Columbia Institute for Ideas and Imagination - 2025-26 Fellowship Application

• Award Period: September 1, 2025–May 31, 2026
• Application Deadline: September 30, 2024 (5:00 PM EST - New York City time zone)

Each year the Institute brings together a cohort of 14 Fellows, half of them Columbia faculty and post-docs, the other half artists and writers from around the world, to spend a year together in work and conversation.

There are two categories of fellows:

• Creative artists of all kinds (including visual artists, film-makers, writers, composers, poets, and others), from anywhere in the world excluding USA residents. Creative writers (novelists, poets, playwrights, journalists, essayists) must demonstrate a record of publication; visual artists, musicians, and sound artists must have a significant body of work that has been exhibited or performed in public. There are no higher education requirements for this category of applicant.


• Faculty and recent PhDs from Columbia University (plus Barnard College and Teachers' College). Tenured and tenure-track University faculty from any School are eligible as are adjunct teaching faculty whose appointment extends beyond the fellowship year. At least one fellowship annually may be awarded to a recent Columbia PhD who has or will have defended his or her dissertation between September 2022 and December 31, 2024. Faculty should notify their department chairs or Dean of their intention to apply for this fellowship. The Institute staff can, upon request, direct applicants to the appropriate university office to discuss the financial implications of an award. Only faculty can apply for a single semester fellowship.

The fellowship comprises a stipend of $75,000 for a full academic year at Reid Hall in Paris (September through May), an office at the Institute, and access to Columbia’s libraries as well as associated research facilities in Paris and elsewhere. We welcome projects from those working in any area of the humanities, the social sciences, and conceptual dimensions of the natural and applied sciences, as well as from visual and sound artists, filmmakers, composers, writers, and other creative thinkers.

Please note: We cannot accommodate groups.

The Institute for Ideas and Imagination is a residential program. Regular participation within the community of Fellows is a core commitment of acceptance of the fellowship. Fellows are required to work at the Columbia Institute for Ideas and Imagination in Paris. There will also be opportunities to host workshops and conferences. We therefore ask that other professional obligations such as teaching, speaking engagements, and research trips be kept to a minimum for the duration of the fellowship. The Institute reserves the right to pro-rate a fellow’s stipend for extensive absences.

The Institute for Ideas and Imagination will not accept dossier letters in place of new letters of recommendation.

Applications to the fellowship competition must be in English. Although we aim to foster a multi-lingual environment, the working language of the Institute is English.

The Columbia Institute for Ideas and Imagination is made possible by the generous support of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF), the Areté Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and Daniel Cohen, with additional gifts from Judith Ginsberg and Paul LeClerc, Olga and George Votis, the EHA Foundation, Fondation Louis Roederer, Tom and Maarit Glocer, Gerald M. Rosberg, and Mel and Lois Tukman.