mmm mmm. As an artist working in video, this may be tasty just for me, but I thought this was a good place to share. AU's Center for Social Media breaks down fair use into a mash up all its own. Go here for the written guide in simple people words.

Opening Reception: Friday, June 19, 6 – 9 pm at the Arlington Art Center



clockwise from top left:
Peter Gordon, Going Green: Cap and Trade #1, Mixed Media on Wood Panel, 10x15", 2009; Mark Planisek, 6th and K St. NW, Photo Box Collage, 6-1/2x8-1/2x2-1/2, 2008; Karen Joan Topping, Still - Red Light, Green Light, Digital Video DVD 8 minutes 20seconds, 2008; Deborah Carroll Anzinger, detail - My Sister Had a Pogo Stick, 64x56", oil, resin and sharpie


Sparkplug; NEW WORK

Arlington Arts Center, Jenkins Community Gallery, June 19 – August 22, 2009

Opening Reception: Friday, June 19, 6 – 9 pm

Artists Talk: Wednesday, July 22, 7 – 9 pm


DC Arts Center’s resident arts collective Sparkplug is, at present, a spirited gathering of ten artists and curators who meet twice a month to discuss their work, explore the arts in the nation’s capital, grow their community, and dream up creative engagements in DC and around the globe. In the context of this closely-focused show, Sparkplug’s mission will be to testify to its own mutable now: the now of its production, the now of its collective exchanges, the now of individual stances outside of the collective, the now that will inevitably be then soon. For a collective whose very existence is based on a charter of becoming, of sharing, of transitions, of emergence, of change…the privileging of a specific Sparkplug moment presents a persistent (albeit purposeful) challenge.


Curated by Lea-Ann Bigelow and Blair Murphy, the show will highlight painting, drawing, video, photography, and mixtures thereof by:

Deborah Carroll-Anzinger, Peter Gordon, Lisa McCarty, Kathryn McDonnell, Michael Matason, Mark Planisek, Karen Joan Topping and Jenny Walton.

Creative Capital | Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant Accepting Applications

holycreamoly - another crazy amazing arts writing grant op - you know who you are -

The Creative Capital | Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant provides project grants to individual authors whose work addresses contemporary visual art. The program is spearheaded by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts as part of its broader Arts Writing Initiative and is administered by the Creative Capital Foundation.

The Arts Writers Grant Program issues awards for books, articles, short-form writing, blogs, and new and alternative media projects. The program aims to support the broad spectrum of writing on contemporary visual art from general-audience criticism to academic scholarship.

Only individuals are eligible for a grant. Applicants must be an art historian, artist, critic, curator, journalist, or practitioner in an outside field strongly engaged with the contemporary visual arts. Nominees must also be at least 25 years of age and be a published author (specific publication requirements vary depending on project type).

Applicants are not eligible if applying on behalf of an organization or for a project in which his/her primary involvement will be as an editor. Full-time students in degree-granting programs (with the exception of those students who are simultaneously maintaining professional careers as arts writers) are not eligible.

The program supports approximately twenty to twenty-five projects a year. Grant amounts range from $3,000 to $50,000 each, depending on the scope and complexity of the project.

Visit the program's Web site for project-specific requirements and application procedures.



http://www.artswriters.org/guidelines.php



http://foundationcenter.org/pnd/rfp/rfp_item.jhtml?id=250900025

SP Minutes 4/14/09

Attendance: Peter, Kathryn, Karen, Lea-Ann, Blair, Jenny, Deborah, Mike

Lea ruled the day with a smashing agenda and new list of dates

1) “Sparkplug: New Work” is the title that Lea & Blair have chosen for the AAC show – rather than Decay & Development or some riff on that. They still have every intention of addressing that idea and our place relative to Cudlin’s show in the main gallery “Paradox Now” in their message for the show.

2) WED., APRIL 22nd – DCAC newsletter ‘press’ date :( this pertains to the curators and KAREN, MARK, DEBORAH and PETER). Lea’s idea was to create another simple composite image featuring the 4 artists that were not on the April 2008 show card for DCAC- which means that KAREN, MARK, DEBORAH and PETER need to get high-resolution images to Blair -ideally before the 22nd of April so she can try to work a tiny box for us into the DCAC newsletter.

3) MONDAY, MAY 4th - AAC press release info: High-resolution images from EVERYONE of the piece we are putting in the show – including full description title, size, year and material and any other description that is requested.

4) Marketing/Dissemination of Information: Lea started some discussion about a ‘brochure’ instead of a postcard-more specifically a “Broadsheet” – we talked a lot about this – but didn’t come to any hard and fast resolutions. Jenny is going to see if she knows a designer that wants to design it pro-bono or if she can get a printing deal. Kathryn and Mike both seemed to have some interest in doing the design on a brochure once we all submit our info on May 4th. I feel like the general consensus is that we all want to pursue making sure we document this show with something even though we will have to fund doing a brochure for the AAC show on our individual dollars (my past discussions with B lending themselves to DCAC supporting the marketing of shows we have @ DCAC – not necessarily shows we have at other locations). Doing as much work on it as we can ourselves is probably best.

As the show creeps up on us I’d say to anyone that is fielding information or donations of time or design or services report back to us all as you get your info. So that we can get a decision on how we should proceed as soon as possible.

5) AAC Storeroom – we suggested the evening of Thursday - April 30 (even though if you saw my other email - I want to recall my saying that day was OK with me - I want to see Martha Rosler) or Sunday afternoon, May 3rd. Anyway – curators will give us the day that Jeffry decides on to go see the space and see what fixtures the AAC has available. Lea would like as many of us that can make it to try to attend this – even if you think you don’t need fixtures.

6) AAC hosted Sparkplug Panel: there was no dissention to trying to set up a panel sometime in July at the AAC about Sparkplug. Lea will try to set a date ASAP (by the DCAC press date) so the date of the panel can be in the newsletter.

******While there was no dissention – keep in mind that the PLAN is for ALL of US to be on the panel – if you are going to go to Egypt or something for the whole month of July we need to know NOW*****

Lea & Blair are trying to tap Kathryn Cornelius (http://kathryncornelius.com/) to moderate – but other suggestions would be welcome ASAP.

Some great ideas were throw-around for doing panels in conjunction with the Fall show at DCAC by hosting panels or other reach out events to media, design, music, street art, political art that are very different from us – but identify with the word COLLECTIVE – like DECCA, BeeHive, Code Pink and Kathryn said E32 would be a great resource to tap for NYC collectives

7) Please make sure your membership is update at the Sparkplug level!!!!
8) Take a look at the Flickr group we spent until 10 PM looking at the 2009 Proto AAC show images and tongue-wagging about how cool the show is going to be (for a little show)

ACTION THIS WEEK

****DON’T forget LISA’s opening at AAC this Friday the 17th

****Peter’s open studio this Sunday the 19th at 3 PM – directions under a separate email

IMPORTANT DATES:

Deadline for DCAC press ready artist materials from Peter, Karen, Mark & Deborah-April 22.

AAC Storeroom meeting: TBD (last week of April)

Deadline for AAC press ready artist materials-May 4.

Sparkplug Meeting, Tuesday, May 12 starts between 7 & 730 PM, at DCAC

DCAC GALA: Friday, May 29th

Updates for Sparkplug Binder (resume & general artist statements) to Peter: TBD

Installation at the AAC: Begins Wednesday, June 10 and runs through Thursday, June 18. Your availability on the weekend of June 13 & 14 will be the most critical. Show opening is Friday June 19. Show ends Saturday, August 22.

Sparkplug Panel Discussion at DCAC: date TBD (tentatively July)
Installation at DCAC: Tuesday, October 13 and Wednesday, October 14 (Expect EVENING hours, just like our 2008 installation). Opening is Friday, October 16. Show ends on Sunday, November 15. De-installation is the evening of Sunday, November 15 and all day and evening Monday, November 16, which is also critical.

Lea will email us the AAC’s loan forms, there are 2. One that everyone fills out and one regarding exceptions. They have insurance that covers the exhibit of artist work, with some EXCEPTIONS, like works on paper that are not framed. We will each get this document sometime in the future which spells out the specifics of what is not covered.

Please feel free to add anything I forgot –phew that was a lot.

As much as possible given the time and space allotted. from Galerie Leonard & Bina Ellen on Vimeo.

OK - I seriously do not know what to think about this...as someone who has worked behind the scenes in museums, (like about 1/3 of us in Sparkplug) I have seen 'the stacks' and know the beautiful collisions that can happen on those racks where items are put together solely based on available space-like a little Daumier painting ending up next to a big Bonnard, where proximity creates affinity. Dollars to donuts that's the kind of thing you'd have to travel through space and time to actually see hung up in a museum - unlikely matches happen, but rarely.

It also struck me that this show looks a lot like the proverbial mid-century SOHO painters loft (Alice Neel's is infamously described in my circle of education) where finished paintings line every available space not needed for walking or working. This kind of chaos is often where us 'art professionals' work - why not drive that point home to the pedestrian public?

Well frankly, because when I see it on 'tv' I realize how freaking insane it looks - how does clearness of message arise out of this horror vacui?

Well brother - it just does. Contemplate that.

For those of you that saw "Vincent" at DCAC recently - more talk about artists and their drive for something more from Elizabeth Gilbert. Plus check out Ted.com where there is lots of other progressive stuff.

Elsewhere Artist Collaborative



WOW - this gem was brought to me by my BF listserve - artinfobank - so brilliant - residencies in a former thriftstore that was never cleaned out - a shangrila of stuff to make art with - and they like to take 'colloboratives' as residents - wow can you imagine if we all went? Junk has been an important part of the development in my personal art practice, it would be interesting to share perspectives with those of you that are not so stuff oriented xo Karen

Residencies at Elsewhere

Elsewhere’s dynamic architectures and the immense 58-year collection of American cultural objects (thousands of toys, books, periodicals, clothing, fabric, games, trinkets, bric-a-brac, furniture, antiques, army surplus, and historical documents) housed on-site serve as a resource for the cultivation of new creative processes and the creation of new works.

Elsewhere’s residency program invites emerging and established artists and scholars to create site-specific works using the plethora of objects and dynamic spaces as materials for works or as a foundation for conceptual or technological projects. Residents launch projects from within the theoretical framework of an evolving exhibition of objects and artworks across media, composing an experimental museum rethinking the premise of the collector and collection, questions of history and myth, the stasis of the art object, the role of the artist, and the relationship of process within production.

Elsewhere offers a dynamic alternative to the museum and gallery spaces and traditional residency formats. Artists find Elsewhere residencies to be intensive, conceptually challenging, and highly playful. Working within transforming installations, artists engage interactive environments as platforms for conceptualizing their practices. An Elsewhere residency becomes an ongoing artistic happening formed by an evolving dialogue that explores responsive artistic practices as a means of communication within an artist community. While artists are given control over their individual work for the time of their stay, artists collaboratively build upon others’ visions in response to the developing installation. The opportunity to build alongside, work with, or even transform past artists’ work yields layered histories of experimentation, communication, and art production that resituates the creative possibilities for the museum-as-medium.

While all work produced with Elsewhere’s objects stays within the space (works in reproducible media are shared with Elsewhere and curated within the environment), artists have the opportunity to expand and apply their body of work on an unprecedented scope and scale while furthering the development of a collaboratively built museum. Elsewhere’s collaborative framework cultivates continued feedback and response throughout the creative process from the directors and other artists. Interns and production staff assist artists with documentation, creation and curation.

Residents are encouraged to spend one month creating in the space. No proposals are requested. Instead, we ask artists to draw their ideas from the space itself, its resources, and the multiplicity of systematic arrangements and performative organizations that interweave resource, artwork, and collaborative artistic response.

Residents pay a $200 residency fee and $50 deposit to hold space upon acceptance of invitation. Residents are required to fund their own travel, although Elsewhere, as a 501(c)3 non-profit organization, can assist artists with granting opportunities. Collaborative or collective groups are encouraged to apply. Shorter residencies and student-residencies are available.

The application requires a written portion including a written application, resume/CV, digital work samples, and a phone interview.