Curatorial Council
The Ragdale Curatorial Council is comprised of notable artists and alumni, who represent the diversity of artistic practices, perspectives, and backgrounds served by Ragdale. Each year, the Curatorial Council is charged with selecting artists in residence and advising on the awarding of fellowships, based on applicants to the program. In making selections, council members evaluate applications based on originality and inventiveness of work samples, the relevance of work samples to contemporary practice, and the impact that a residency at Ragdale would have on the development of an applicant's work. The Curatorial Council serves a vital role in helping Ragdale meet its mission to steward an inspirational environment that fosters courageous creativity and inclusive community.
Curatorial Council Chair
Ignatius Valentine Aloysius is a naturalized U.S. citizen, born in India and raised in Mumbai by a Tamilian father and Anglo-Indian mother. He earned his MFA in Creative Writing from Northwestern University, where he won the Distinguished Thesis Award for fiction. He is a lecturer in writing at Northwestern University’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and in the Writing Program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). Ignatius is the current host and curator of the long-running reading series Sunday Salon Chicago. A resident of Evanston, he also serves as a mayor-appointed board member of the Evanston Arts Council. Twice Pushcart nominated, Ignatius is the author of the literary novel Fishhead. Republic of Want, and Salt Pruning, a collaborative poetry collection, co-authored with David Allen Sullivan, recent poet laureate of Santa Cruz county, CA. A second poetry collection, Bone Dust Mother is forthcoming on Glass Lyre Press in Spring 2026. Ignatius' prose and poetry appear in several venues, including Allium: A Journal of Poetry & Prose, Another Chicago Magazine, Cold Mountain Review, Porter Gulch Review, Roi Fainéant Press, The Rumpus, and others. He is currently shopping a speculative lyrical novel and his next collaborative poetry collection. Visit his Linktree here.
