Art Career

“No one every told me that grief felt so like fear.” -C.S. Lewis

Loss manifests in many forms. It can be the scraping chasm of a loved one departed, the sudden revocation of freedoms we take for granted or the unwelcome knowledge that our own person is susceptible in a way we had never considered. We grieve these things and it frightens us as we slowly accept, piece by piece, a changed reality from the one we thought we knew. Eventually we adapt, but the loss remains with us forever, altering our perception of the world in an irreversible way.

Desi Mundo lives and works in Oakland, California where, among other things, he is a part time middle school and high school educator. When he spoke to us on March 25 during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, he admitted that in a way the slow down caused by the global emergency has opened up more time for him to work on other projects. His high school students were in the middle of a mural when schools shut down so he worries that some of his seniors won’t have the opportunity to complete the work. But while the world is paused, he has taken time to plan an 8-story mural project that will be painted on the side of a building in downtown Oakland. To hear how he became involved in this project, and much more, listen to the complete interview.

Leila Seyedzadeh spoke to us from her home studio in Brooklyn where she was sheltering in place during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. While home, she is busy preparing for an upcoming show based on stories, music and more from Persian culture. Themes of migration and portable landscape are something she has been exploring – considering her adopted home of New York City and her native home of Tehran. Seyedzadeh works alongside her mother creating vibrant works with dyed cotton cloth. To hear more about these projects and other work, listen to the complete interview.

A Few Words to Keep in your Pocket:

There is no wrong way to feel when everything we thought we knew is changing – the loss and fear, the quiet acceptance, all these things are useful and correct.

Interviews are available on iTunes as podcasts, and for Android please click here. All weekly essay pieces in a shareable format are here. The full archive of interviews here.

Books to Read

What are you reading? Add your titles to our reading list here. Desi Mundo is reading Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer. Leila Seyedzadeh is reading In Praise of Shadows by Jun’ichiro Tanizaki.

Deadlines

Drawing Lab Paris extends an open call for a contemporary drawing exhibition. Artist/curator duos are invited to present their proposals for an exhibition. The Drawing Lab offers a budget of 20,000 Euros for each selected project. Those pursuing new and innovative work are encouraged to apply. All artists and curators must be at least 25 years of age. For more details, visit the website. Deadline is April 5.

 

Weekly Edited Grant and Residency Deadlines – review the list here.

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Brainard Carey is an author, artist and educator. He is the director of Praxis Center for Aesthetics. He has written six books for artists; Making it in the Art World, New Markets for Artists, The Art World Demystified, Fund Your Dreams Like a Creative Genius, Sell Online Like a Creative Genius and Succeed with Social Media Like a Creative Genius.

We find ourselves with found time – life has slowed to a pace rarely seen in our modern age. What to do with this time? For artists, this is an ideal opportunity to explore what lies ahead, use time each day to seek out and apply for those career building exhibitions and residencies down the road. This time of isolation and pause will come to an end and we will all venture back out into the world. Be ready to hit the ground running.

Drawing Lab Paris extends an open call for a contemporary drawing exhibition. Artist/curator duos are invited to present their proposals for an exhibition. The Drawing Lab offers a budget of 20,000 Euros for each selected project. Those pursuing new and innovative work are encouraged to apply. All artists and curators must be at least 25 years of age. For more details, visit the website. Deadline is April 5.

Halcyon Art Lab invites artists to apply for cohort 4 to run from September to February. This opportunity offers emerging artists the chance to grow and collaborate while expanding the social impact of their work. All applicants should be prepared to be in residence in Washington D.C. for the duration of the fellowship. For full details, visit the website. Deadline is April 8.

The Victim of Vukovar is an international arts competition aimed at establishing a dialog with contemporary art practices based on the culture of memory and symbolism of war suffering of the city of Vukovar. Selected works will be exhibited in Zagreb in June 2020 as part of the occasion of the Croatian presidency of the Council of the European Union. Selected artists will receive an artist fee. For more information, visit the website. Deadline is April 9.

At Praxis Center, we place high importance on helping artists find their paths. We are a team of experts dedicated to making sure that our students have the tools and skills they need to help their careers soar. While this is an unprecedented moment for the entire world, we are here for you throughout and will continue doing what we do best once the dust has settled and life has moved back to its usual pace. For now, grab hold of the time we have been given and set a course for success.

Brainard Carey is an author, artist and educator. He is the director of Praxis Center for Aesthetics. He has written six books for artists; Making it in the Art World, New Markets for Artists, The Art World Demystified, Fund Your Dreams Like a Creative Genius, Sell Online Like a Creative Genius and Succeed with Social Media Like a Creative Genius.

 

Photo credit: Jorge Franganillo

 

“No man is an island.” -John Donne

As we retreat to our homes, watching our daily rhythm topple piece by piece, perhaps we are all discovering the ways in which we lean on each other that we never noticed before. Although we must by necessity remain distant, let us not isolate ourselves by voice, by spirit, by thought. Now is the moment to bring back the ways that were lost so quickly when the age of the internet took hold, when our children drew inside to play by algorithm rather than with each other, when we began to worship in screens in solitary rather than congregate.

Adam de Boer lives and works in Los Angeles. When he spoke to us he was enmeshed in a series of batik paintings for an exhibition at Hunter Shaw Fine Art Gallery alongside the work of artist Tammy Nguyen. Batik is a wax resist dying technique native to Java Indonesia, where de Boer’s father was born. Growing up a suburban kid, it was surfing that first led de Boer back to his ancestral home where he encountered Batik. His paintings are hybrid works that draw on his particular ancestry and trajectory. The cover image on this week’s newsletter is de Boer’s Fool’s Cap Map of the World which the artist discusses extensively in the interview. To hear this and more, listen to the entire conversation.

Nicole Schmolzer spoke to us from Switzerland in an area without a vibrant arts scene although Schmozer herself had a robust primary school art education in her little town. She is not far from Basel where the art scene is world famous but for Schmolzer the scene wasn’t enough so she left for New York once completing school. Her time there helped define her work and studio practice. For her, the change between the two places was a benefit, offering different ways of working. Her studio in Switzerland is larger and her community quieter as opposed to New York where space is limited and you never know what will happen from day to day. Both worlds, Schmolzer says, have their place. To hear more about her career and insights, listen to the complete interview.

A Few Words to Keep in your Pocket:

Although the way ahead remains uncertain, and many of us are forced apart, we can embrace community in other forms now and use this strange found time to reconnect.

Interviews are available on iTunes as podcasts, and for Android please click here. All weekly essay pieces in a shareable format are here. The full archive of interviews here.

Books to Read

What are you reading? Add your titles to our reading list here. Adam de Boer is reading Portraits by John Berger. Nicole Schmolzer is reading The Art of Rivalry by Sebastian Smee.

Deadlines

Artists and curators interested in the opportunity to hold an exhibit at a storefront gallery in East Chelsea, New York are invited to apply for CUE‘s current open call. Two artists as well as an emerging curator are selected each year and are paired up with a CUE selection panel member who acts as guide. CUE offers shipping budget, honorarium and other incentives to selected artists and curators. For full details, visit the website. Deadline for submissions is March 18.

 

Weekly Edited Grant and Residency Deadlines – review the list here.

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Brainard Carey is an author, artist and educator. He is the director of Praxis Center for Aesthetics. He has written six books for artists; Making it in the Art World, New Markets for Artists, The Art World Demystified, Fund Your Dreams Like a Creative Genius, Sell Online Like a Creative Genius and Succeed with Social Media Like a Creative Genius.

We face unprecedented times. No one can predict the outcome nor the course that things will take as we ride the tsunami of this global pandemic. Now more than ever, we must band together as an artistic community, support on another in any way we can, and above all we must prepare, not panic. Below find a list of organizations that offer emergency funding to artists based on varied criteria. Please note that we cannot guarantee that every one will be accepting applications if volume increases.

Boston Artist Relief Fund

CERF+The Artists Safety Net

Foundation for Contemporary Artists

I Care if you Listen COVID-19 Emergency Fund

Springboard for the Arts

Finally, New York Foundation for the Arts has compiled a list of emergency funding – some of which might be also named here – you can find it by clicking here

We are in this together. While it may sound cliche, Praxis Center exists to support artist in every step of their careers. For better or worse, we are your constant companion and if there are resources you would like to see in the coming weeks and months, please don’t hesitate to contact us and we would be more than happy to do whatever we can to find them. Be healthy, be safe.

Brainard Carey is an author, artist and educator. He is the director of Praxis Center for Aesthetics. He has written six books for artists; Making it in the Art World, New Markets for Artists, The Art World Demystified, Fund Your Dreams Like a Creative Genius, Sell Online Like a Creative Genius and Succeed with Social Media Like a Creative Genius.

“Solitude is fine but you need someone to tell that solitude is fine.” -Honore de Balzac

The world faces a moment perhaps like no other – when each of us in our heavily connected lives must retreat to the relative safety of home, eschewing the company of others for a time. We are accustomed to moving as we please, when we please, and the world economy relies on our ability to do so. Now is a moment when the world slows its collective pace, finds a new rhythm for a while, relies on each other to keep us all safe. Now is a time to go back to ways we have quickly forgotten – to picking up the phone or writing a letter to a friend to make sure they are OK and to say that although we are all apart, in truth we are together.

Frans van Lent spoke to us for a second time from the Netherlands where he lives and works. At present, van Lent has a live IndieGoGo project titled La Biennale de Momon. Momon is a very small town in France with a handful of homes but no church or other public facilities. Van Lent has a home there and has witnessed the complete transformation of this once farming village to a small enclave of retired people from other countries. While the material aspects of the village remain unchanged, the influence of the people coming and going differ vastly from 30 years ago. The Biennale brings together seven artists who will create online-only work. Each artist will live in the village for a week, familiarizing themselves with the place and preparing to create. At the end of the Biennale, they will leave absolutely no trace on the village. The project will take place in July 2020. To hear more about this and other projects by Frans van Lent, listen to the complete interview.

Carol Ann Davis is a writer who spoke to us about her recent book The Nail in the Tree. Aside from her writing, she teaches at Fairfield University and, at the time she spoke to us on March 11, 2020, was in the process of preparing the university for remote learning in response to the COVID-19 Pandemic. Her new book is an essay collection narrating her time living in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook shooting in Newtown. Her sons were elementary students at another school in Newtown that day and this book examines that day and raising her boys in the subsequent years. To hear more about how Davis took on the daunting task of getting words on paper about this personal and indeed national trauma, listen to the complete interview.

A Few Words to Keep in your Pocket:

Lean into the relative solitude of this moment, but find ways to reach out while you do.

Interviews are available on iTunes as podcasts, and for Android please click here. All weekly essay pieces in a shareable format are here. The full archive of interviews here.

Books to Read

What are you reading? Add your titles to our reading list here. Carol Ann Davis’ book The Nail in the Tree: Essays on Art, Violence and Childhood can be found, along with her other works, at  .

Deadlines

Artists and curators interested in the opportunity to hold an exhibit at a storefront gallery in East Chelsea, New York are invited to apply for CUE‘s current open call. Two artists as well as an emerging curator are selected each year and are paired up with a CUE selection panel member who acts as guide. CUE offers shipping budget, honorarium and other incentives to selected artists and curators. For full details, visit the website. Deadline for submissions is March 18.

 

Weekly Edited Grant and Residency Deadlines – review the list here.

—

Brainard Carey is an author, artist and educator. He is the director of Praxis Center for Aesthetics. He has written six books for artists; Making it in the Art World, New Markets for Artists, The Art World Demystified, Fund Your Dreams Like a Creative Genius, Sell Online Like a Creative Genius and Succeed with Social Media Like a Creative Genius.