Intersection for the Arts is launching a building-wide exploration of how each one of us experiences and understands fear and terror, which will culminate in a visual arts exhibition opening September 2006. There are a number of ways in which you can participate – through contributing your artwork to Intersection’s first open call juried show in over a decade, to sharing your stories or your experiences.
Are you scared? What are you scared of? How does fear immobilize or control you and the world around you? What does fear cost? Where does personal fear intersect with larger societal and political messages of terror? These are some of the questions we are interested in exploring through Terror?, a networking experiment investigating how people all over the world experience fear and how it affects our lives. Utilizing the internet as a starting place, this project is about searching for new and true definitions for a word that has become all too pervasive. Where are we now – five years from September 11, 2001? How much do we really know about what people around the world are experiencing? What kind of a here and now do we have? And, what kind of future? How do we actively and hopefully break through media distortions, manufactured information and a seemingly constant war agenda? Selected entries will be exhibited at Intersection for the Arts in San Francisco, California, U.S. for two months beginning on the 5-year Anniversary of 9/11 – September 11 through November 11, 2006.
Please include a self addressed stamped envelope with proper postage for the return of your work. You will be notified by email of your involvement in the exhibition, so please be sure to provide a valid e-mail address with your materials. Intersection is not responsible for returning works submitted without a self addressed stamped envelope. Following the exhibition, selected works may be passed along to other non-governmental international organizations and entities in order to continue to develop and deepen networks. The artist agrees to provide for the return of work, including adequate provisions for shipping costs and insurance. Local artists in Northern California can arrange to drop off for consideration and pick up at the close of the exhibition work directly at Intersection. There is no entry fee for submitting work for consideration.
It is our hope that this experiment can live and grow beyond the walls of Intersection for the Arts. If you have ideas about how to continue this exploration in your own gallery or space or in a completely different way, please contact us at terror@theintersection.org.
Works submitted should be 2-D works (painting, illustration, design, collage, photography, printmaking, Xerox, textile) no larger than 11 inches high by 8.5 inches wide (or for international entries, standard A4 paper, 297mm high by 210mm wide). Digital submissions will only be accepted in PDF format, and must be formatted to print no larger than 11 inches high by 8.5 inches wide (or for international entries, standard A4 size, 297mm high by 210mm wide). We will accept up to 5 works per artist for consideration.
Selected entries will be exhibited at Intersection for the Arts in San Francisco, California, United States from September 11 through November 11, 2006.
Are you scared? What are you scared of? Do you ever feel immobilized, paralyzed? Why? How does fear control you and the world around you? What does fear cost? Where does personal fear intersect with larger societal and political messages of terror? These are some of the questions we are interested in exploring through Terror?, an international interdisciplinary project investigating how each one of us experiences fear and how it affects our lives.
Please send us your thoughts and reactions to the above questions. With the Terror? Story Project, we aim to collect, reflect upon and incorporate your responses to these questions as we prepare to open a major installation in solemn commemoration of the 5th Anniversary of September 11, 2001. Your response may be woven into Constructed Fears, an Open Process Series event on Wednesday, August 9, 2006 designed to involve as many people as we can in the visioning for this important project which will open on September 11, 2006.
We hope to collect and share answers & feedback to the above questions via theatrical readings and performances by local artists. With our Open Process Series, we hope also to democratize the artistic process by inviting as many people to contribute and help shape the ideas as we can.
We are looking to hear from as many people and share as many stories and as possible for this first event surrounding Terror?
INTERSECTION FOR THE ARTS is San Francisco’s oldest alternative art space and provides a place where provocative ideas, diverse art forms, artists and audiences can intersect one another. At Intersection, experimentation and risk are possible, debate and critical inquiry are embraced, community is essential, resources and experience are democratized, and today’s issues are thrashed about in the heat and immediacy of live art. We depend on the support of people like you. To become a Member, simply visit our Website and click on the Donate Now icon at www.theintersection.org. All Members receive a Limited Edition T-shirt.