Six writers receive writing fellowships at universities in Denmark, Greenland and on the Faroe Islands

VELUX FONDEN's pilot project Writers-in-residence aims to encourage dialogue between the humanities and artistic practice and to strengthen literature - now in all three parts of the Danish realm. Six talented writers are receiving fellowships to write in university environments.

The new fiction writers-in-residence are: Sørine Steenholdt, René Jean Jensen, Peder Frederik Jensen, Alen Meskovic, Maja Lee Langvad and Anna Malan Jógvansdóttir. Soon, they will be taking up residence at University of Greenland, Aalborg University, the University of Southern Denmark and the University of the Faroe Islands.

VELUX FONDEN runs the programme in order to strengthen fictional writing and pave the way for new literary breakthroughs. Creating time and space for collaboration and mutual inspiration between writers, researchers and students will hopefully lead to new and creative realisations and expressions.

"Based on our positive collaboration with the literary environments at the six Danish universities and the highly talented writers who received the first writers-in-residence grants a year ago, we have now expanded the circle of invitees to include the literary environments at the universities in Greenland and on the Faroe Islands. The grantees from these universities are testament to the high artistic standards of these writing environments, and will be able to use the grants to seek inspiration for their further artistic development. At the same time, we hope that increasing the scope of the programme will strengthen the literary ties between the three countries. In all three countries, fiction plays a crucial role in society and to democracy", says head of programme Henrik Tronier at VELUX FONDEN.

Sørine Steenholdt says: "I'm really looking forward to working with the researchers, lecturers and especially the students at the Institute of Culture, Language and History. The timing couldn't be better, because there's an exciting development going on in literary life in Greenland, and the potential of literature is growing. Last but not least, I'm really looking forward to getting the time to finish a draft I've been working on".