Monthly Archives: December 2013

CALL FOR ENVIRONMENTAL AND ECOLOGICAL ARTISTS

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CALL FOR ENVIRONMENTAL AND ECOLOGICAL ARTISTS
Proposals Due January 13, 2014
Transformation without Apocalypse: How to Live Well on an Altered Planet

Concept: We invite artists to submit proposals for interactive art projects that radically
re-imagine how to live well on an altered planet. We know that humans will be living differently in the very near future, perhaps occasioned by catastrophes brought on by forces of greed and climatic disintegration. We also know that we can choose, by acts of imagination and collective will, to create new narratives of how to inhabit the planet. We invite proposals that create these tangible visions of new/old ways to live. Projects should explore who we are in relation to the world and how we ought to live without exhausting the Earth.

The ideal project will:
• Thoughtfully explore the concept “Transformation without Apocalypse.”
• Include an interactive component during the Transformation without Apocalypse symposium on February 15, 2014 at LaSells Stewart Center in Corvallis, Oregon. The interactive component will invite students and community members to help in the creation of your artwork. Artists are asked to create a hands-on experience for symposium visitors. Options include inviting visitors to experiment with your materials and/or process, to design a collaborative work of art that visitors will help create, to design a component of your work of art that is inspired by your interactive experience at the symposium, etc. To this end, artists must be willing to speak with visitors, answer questions, and to invite visitors into your creative process. Your interactive component should last from at least noon to 7:00 p.m. on February 15. You are encouraged to continue the interactive aspect of your project after the symposium, however you may also choose to work independently.
• Invite students and the community to think deeply about how to live well on an altered planet.
• Take any form including, but not limited to painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, mural, collage, etc.
• Not exceed 4 x 6’ for 2D proposals and 3 x 3 x 6’ for 3D proposals.
• Be completed and installed in a prominent location on campus (TBD by Environmental Arts and Humanities) by March 21, 1014.

Project timeline:
• January 13: Proposal submission deadline.
• January 20: Winners announced.
• February 15: Community engagement during the Transformation without Apocalypse symposium at OSU.
• February 16 – March 20: Continue to work on your project at your studio. You may choose to continue the community engagement aspects of your project during this time or work on the piece independently.
• March 21: Installation complete.

Eligibility: The Environmental Arts and Humanities Initiative will consider applications by student artists, professional artists, or artist teams. The artist (or at least one of the artist if working on a team) must live or work within a 100-mile radius of Corvallis, Oregon and be available to attend the Transformation without Apocalypse symposium on February 15. Each applicant, or each team, may submit one design for consideration.
Compensation: The artist or artist team will be awarded a $2,000 artwork contract plus up to $1,000 for materials. Materials reimbursement will be for actual costs of materials and require detailed, original receipts. The $2,000 will be awarded after March 21 and be dependent on the completion of the contract.

Submit a proposal: Artists are invited to submit a proposal on or before January 13, 2014 by 1) emailing a single PDF document to Carly.Lettero[at]oregonstate.edu or 2) mailing one copy of your submission to: Environmental Arts and Humanities; c/o Carly Lettero; 208 Gilkey Hall; Oregon State University; Corvallis, Oregon 97333. Please note that mailed submissions must arrive on or before January 13. Late submissions will not be considered.

Proposal must include the following:
1. Artist’s statement
2. Current resume (for each artist, if working as a team).
3. Visual documentation in digital format of previous works, with all images clearly annotated.
4. Specifications and installation information including:
a. Details of proposed project: Describe your proposed project with text, sketches, models, or other documentation. Each artist or artist team may submit one design.
b. Student and community involvement: 1) How will you involve students and community members in the creation of your piece during the Transformation without Apocalypse symposium on February 15, 2014? 2) Approximately how many students and community members would be involved? 3) If you will continue to involve the community in your project after February 15, how will you involve them?
c. Work plan after the symposium: Where will you work on the project after the symposium (e.g., in your own studio)? How will you transport your materials from the symposium to your workspace and finally, to the installation space?
d. Timeline: What is your timeline for the project? Please note that the installation must be complete by March 21, 2014.
e. Long-term maintenance: Will the installation require any long-term maintenance? If so, what maintenance is required and how often will it need to be done?
f. Space: How much space will your installation require 1) during the interactive portion of the Transformation without Apocalypse symposium, and 2) when it is installed (not to exceed 4 x 6’ for 2D proposals and 3 x 3 x 6’ for 3D proposals)?
g. Budget: What is the budget for your project (not to exceed $2,000 for the artwork contract plus up to $1,000 for materials)?
Artist selection criteria include:
• Thoughtful engagement with the theme “Transformation without Apocalypse.”
• Artistic excellence including technical competency and aesthetic content.
• Community engagement in the creation of the piece during the Transformation without Apocalypse symposium on February 15, 2014.
• Plan for long-term maintenance of the artwork if applicable.
• The project’s timeframe and budget.

For more information
• About the Call for Artists: Contact Carly Lettero at Carly.Lettero[at]oregonstate.edu
• About the Environmental Arts and Humanities Initiative visit: http://liberalarts.oregonstate.edu/centers-and-initiatives/environmental-humanities-initiative
• About the Transformation without Apocalypse symposium and the Spring Creek Project visit: http://liberalarts.oregonstate.edu/node/953

Transformation without Apocalypse Speaker Bios

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We’re honored to present some very accomplished and inspiring speakers for the Transformation without Apocalypse symposium, February 14-15. We’ll be sharing more information about them in the New Year, but for now here are brief bios to introduce them.

KEYNOTE SPEAKER BIOS

TIM DECHRISTOPHER
Tim DeChristopher was arrested for sabotaging a 2008 auction of Utah public lands by registering and bidding without the intention to pay. His action became an inspiration to others concerned about the environmental crisis, as well as the story for a documentary, Bidder 70. Together with other activists, he formed Peaceful Uprising, a volunteer-based climate action group committed to defending a livable future from the fossil fuel industry. Tim was released from prison in April 2013 and currently attends Harvard Divinity School. www.peacefuluprising.org

URSULA K. LE GUIN
Ursula Kroeber Le Guin was born in 1929 in Berkeley, and lives in Portland, Oregon. As of 2013, she has published 21 novels, 11 volumes of short stories, four collections of essays, 12 books for children, six volumes of poetry and four of translation, and has received many honors and awards including Hugo, Nebula, National Book Award, and PEN-Malamud. Her most recent publications are Finding My Elegy and The Unreal and the Real. www.ursulakleguin.com

KIM STANLEY ROBINSON
Kim Stanley Robinson is a winner of the Hugo, Nebula, and Locus Awards. Themes in his writing often explore environmentalism, science, and humanism. He is the author of the bestselling Mars Trilogy and many novels, including Fifty Degrees Below, Forty Signs of Rain, The Years of Rice and Salt, and Antarctica–for which he was sent to the Antarctic by the U.S. National Science Foundation as part of their Antarctic Artists and Writers’ Program. www.kimstanleyrobinson.info

KATHLEEN DEAN MOORE
Kathleen Dean Moore is a philosopher, nature writer, public speaker, and defender of all that is wet and wild. She is also a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Philosophy and co-founder and Senior Fellow of the Spring Creek Project. Moore speaks widely to audiences of interested citizens, scientists, church groups, etc. about the need for a moral response to climate destabilization and species loss. Her newest book is MORAL GROUND: Ethical Action for a Planet in Peril. www.riverwalking.com

ROB NIXON
Rob Nixon is the Rachel Carson Professor of English at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he teaches environmental studies, postcolonial studies, creative nonfiction, African literature, world literature, and twentieth century British literature. He is the author of Homelands, Harlem and Hollywood: South African Culture and the World Beyond; Dreambirds: the Natural History of a Fantasy; and Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor. www.english.wisc.edu/rdnixon/

SUSANA ALMANZA
Susana Almanza is the Co-Director of People Organized in Defense of Earth and her Resources (PODER), and is one of three co-chairs for the Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice. She has served on numerous committees including the EPA’s Title VI Implementation Advisory Committee and the City of Austin Environmental Board, and she is a former Planning Commissioner for the City of Austin. She resides in East Austin, Texas. http://www.poder-texas.org/index.html

AMY FRANCESCHINI
Amy Franceschini is concerned with notions of community, sustainable environment, and the perceived conflict between humans and nature. Her work manifests itself on- and offline in the form of dynamic websites, installations, open-access laboratories, and educational formats that challenge the cultural, social, and economic systems we live in. Amy founded Futurefarmers in 1995 and Free Soil in 2004. She has received the Artadia Award, the Eureka Fellowship, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art’s SECA Art Award. www.futurefarmers.com

JOANNA MACY
Joanna Macy is an eco-philosopher and scholar of Buddhism, general systems theory, and deep ecology. Her work addresses psychological and spiritual issues of the nuclear age, the cultivation of ecological awareness, and the fruitful resonance between Buddhist thought and contemporary science. As the root teacher of the Work That Reconnects, she has created a theoretical framework for personal and social change, as well as a powerful workshop methodology for its application. www.joannamacy.net

CAROLYN FINNEY
Carolyn Finney is a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where her work explores how difference, identity, representation, and power play a significant role in determining how people negotiate their daily lives in relation to the environment. Finney serves on a number of national boards and committees including the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Orion Magazine, and the Center for Whole Communities. ourenvironment.berkeley.edu/people_profiles/carolyn-finney/

SARAH VAN GELDER
Sarah van Gelder is the co-founder and executive editor of YES! Magazine, for which common topics include the new economy, climate solutions, alternatives to prisons, food, water, peacemaking, health care, and happiness. She also co-founded Suquamish Olalla Neighbors, which builds bridges between Native and non-Native residents of the Port Madison Reservation, and co-led a statewide effort to return the home of Chief Seattle to the Suquamish Tr

Autumn Campus Creative Ramble

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Gore.Ramble pic.Oct2013

PHOTO: Marie Gore, “spiderweb and rain drops”

Photographer Cub Kahn and writer Jill Sisson were so smitten by last spring’s Campus Creature Census, they offered to do a satellite event, the Autumn Campus Creative Ramble. On Sunday, October 27, Spring Creek volunteer Marie Gore joined the Ramble and shared this account, as well as her beautiful photograph.

“Fourteen of us headed out to ramble around campus, armed with writing materials and cameras of all kinds. At each of the four stops, our leaders offered a nature-related quote to focus our creative juices, followed by ten minutes for taking photos and writing. Unpredicted rain arrived halfway through the Ramble, but that didn’t stop us hearty Oregonians, dressed for anything Mother Nature threw at us.” The Ramble participants gathered again ten days later to share their writings and photos. Many thanks to Cub and Jill, and everyone who joined in the fun.

Spring Creek will again sponsor the Campus Creature Census next spring. We encourage everyone to keep your senses tuned to discover the creature—plant, animal, or natural process—you will want to add to the Census.