Four UNT professors will receive a semester off from teaching to work on personal projects -- ranging from writing poetry to creating a virtual reality program -- after receiving UNT's Institute for the Advancement of the Arts fellowship for 2018-19.

Bruce Bond, Regents Professor of English, second from left, will work on a book-length poem titled The Calling that explores the psychology of language and the way it affects people's personal and political interactions. The book reflects Bond's desire to write longer poems.

"You can break up the long arc of the poem into smaller portions that have an intensity and beauty to them," he says.

Jehanne Dubrow, associate professor of English, left, will write a collection of poems called Wild Kingdom, based on the world of academia. Dubrow will draw from her imagination and 10 years in academics.

"I think certainly other academics will see their own experiences in the book," she says. "And because I think these poems are about larger societal issues, they will resonate even with those who are no longer with an academic institution."

Alicia Eggert, assistant professor of studio art, second from right, will create new work for a solo exhibition in the summer of 2019 at Galeria Fernando Santos in Porto, Portugal. Eggert had a small solo exhibition there in the summer of 2017 after winning the Arts of Laguna Prize in 2016. She says she is both honored and humbled by this award and opportunity.

"That feeling propels me to do my best work," she says.

David Stout, professor of composition and new media, right, will work on The Clearing, the latest piece in a series of hybrid virtual reality installations -- but this work will emit sound and respond to the human voice.

"You're immersed in a world," says Stout, who is coordinator for UNT's Initiative for Advanced Research in Technology and the Arts."It is a plausible yet alien place with an architectural scale that is both intimate and unimaginably vast."