These local geniuses won’t have to worry about making ends meet for the next five years.
Five out of this year’s 23 prestigious MacArthur Fellowships went to research scientists, musicians, and other super-talented New Yorkers.
The fellowships, which award $100,000 a year for five years, are popularly known as “genius grants’’ — but the winners insist they’re just regular Joes.
They are:
-Terry Plank, a professor of earth sciences living in Nyack, who studies volcanoes. “I’m shocked,’’ she said. “I don’t have one of those genius IQs, I’ve just been dogged in what I’ve been working on.”
– Christopher Scott Thile, a mandolin player from the East Village who has performed with master cellist Yo Yo Ma. He said he wants to “reunite what I consider to be a false distinction” between classical and modern music. One of his fans, comedian Steve Martin tweeted, “Congratulations to Chris Thile, mandolin player extraordinaire and musical innovator.’’
– Maria Chudnovsky, a professor of industrial engineering at Columbia, who is researching graph theory, “the theory of how things connect together — there’s a lot of things in the world that connect together,’’ she said. She added winning the prize is “really amazing. I’m still sorting it out and figuring what to do with the money!”
– Laura Poitras, an Academy Award-nominated filmmaker from TriBeCa, whose documentaries focus on America’s wars.
– Claire R. Chase, from Brooklyn, is an solo flutist and advocate for experimental music, who has preformed at Carnegie Hall and premiered over 100 new works for flute over the past ten years.