CultureCandy - v3

Check out this long list of grant opportunities and call for entry for artists of all mediums. Note that the Tennessee Williams Festival short fiction contest deadline is November 15, with a grand prize of $1500, so hurry up wordsmiths!

UPCOMING FEDERAL GRANTS

National Endowment for the Humanities Institutes for Advanced Topics in the Digital Humanities Grant
Deadline: Feb 16
Supports national or regional (multistate) training programs for scholars and advanced graduate students to broaden and extend their knowledge of digital humanities.

http://www07.grants.gov/search/search.do?&mode=VIEW&oppId=58613

NEH National Endowment for the Humanities America’s Historical and Cultural Organizations Grant
Deadline: Jan 12
Support projects in the humanities that explore stories, ideas, and beliefs in order to deepen our understanding of our lives and our world.
http://www07.grants.gov/search/search.do?&mode=VIEW&oppId=58550 Read the rest of this entry »

Looking @ Art where it lives

By Jennifer Gernon

Among the pieces on show at Looking @ Art are stained glass works by Steve Wilson.

Looking @ Art is kicking off its fall tour this week with an inside look at local artist studios, art collector’s homes, and art venues. The tour will take place over five weeks, every Wednesday from 7-9 p.m. beginning Oct. 13 and running through Nov. 10. Registration is $65 at Culture Candy’s website and tickets are transferrable. Culture Candy offers an event calendar for the arts in the city, and artists can add their events to the calendar for free.

The tour is geared towards those interested in learning about how art is made and shown in the city, and for those interested in collecting art. The artists of Looking @ Art work in many types of media, including paint, ceramics, stained glass, photography, installation, and jewelry. Each tour shows different artists, so that participants meet more of the local art community. “It’s a good way to see how art functions,” said Elise Toups, host of Looking @ Art and a painter herself. “If there’s an artist you like, you’ll be in their space, meet them, and see their work.”

For art fans who are not sure where or how to get started with their art collection, Looking @ Art offers plenty of guidance. “It’s an intimate but low-key setting, more laid back than a class but very informative,” said Toups. “You find things you can afford, that little did you know you could afford, and your walls are filled with happiness. I find it an investment in my quality of life. I try to think of it as, that’s only me eating out how many times? And now you have something in your hands for the rest of your life.”

For Toups, knowing where a piece came from, how it was made, and how much time the artist put into creating it makes a huge difference in its appeal. “There’s something beautiful in people creating things when technology provides so many cookie-cutter prints,” Toups said. “You can buy something handmade that someone put an extreme amount of time into, or you can buy something mass-produced, with no imprint of the artist’s hand behind it, and pay the same price.”

Looking @ Art usually makes two stops per evening, this week featuring a retrospective of Bob Hausey, the late LSU painting professor, and a stop at Scott Finch’s studio, whose latest work was recently shown in the Baton Rouge Gallery. The tour will also show work by Hannah Lane Romero and Michelle Conques at the Vanguard Gallery, stained glass by Steve Wilson, jewelry by Madeline Ellis, work by John Guillory, William G. Osborne III, and the private collection of Tom Livesay and Amanda Haralson. The last night of the tour will feature a studio walk through of graduate students Brooke Cassady, Kit French, Kelly Tate, and Adrienne Lynch. “For some artists, it’s a very private space, and it’s an honor to go there,” said Toups.

If those interested in Looking @ Art cannot make it today, the registration fee can be pro-rated and they can attend the next class. Looking @ Art will continue to take registrations until the class is full. Sign up at culturecandy.org, or e-mail Elise Toups directly at etoups@gmail.com.

CultureCandy’s UncommonThread Wearable Art Show, which is usually scheduled for the Fall, has been pushed back to the Spring of 2011. The performance date will be March 26, 2010 8 p.m. at Baton Rouge Gallery and entries are due February 25, 2011 by 5 p.m.

The theme this year is “Chrysalis,” which asks the artist to construct a full garment, wearable art piece inspired by transformation. The show will feature pieces that physically and symbolically demonstrate metamorphosis, mutation and transfiguration.  The judging process will consider originality, sound construction, the use of alternative or hand-made materials and adherence to the theme. The entry fee will be $25 and forms will be available online through www.culturecandy.org beginning in October.

This is a national competition that will be in its fourth year, sponsored by the Arts Council of Greater Baton Rouge. The juror, Manhattan’s Jon Coffelt, the lead designer for Brindisi,  designed swimwear for Nora Nash and worked with Willi Smith (Williwear) in design and fabric selection.  He was the former publisher of  Alabama Art Monthly and has been in over 50 solo and 150 group exhibitions including galleries in Atlanta, Birmingham, Boston, Brooklyn, Charleston, Chattanooga, Los Angeles, Nashville, New Orleans, New York, Miami, Minneapolis, Mobile, Philadelphia, Salt Lake City, San Diego, San Francisco as well as, Barcelona, Kyoto, London, Montreal, Tokyo and Venice.  More about Jon Coffelt and his work can be found here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Coffelt

http://www.absolutad.com/absolut_lists/ads/pictures/?id=2123&_s=ads

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willi_Smith

http://www.fiberarts.com/back_issues/Jan-Feb-2009/memory-clothing.asp

Ephemeral Gallery, the two-year host of the much celebrated Fall and Spring cross-city invitational art show, will now be obstructed by a massive black chain-link fence that runs within two feet of the entrance. The long-treasured mural by Clark Derbes, that covers the entire facing wall of the building, will disappear behind FEMA semi trucks. After several attempts by the owners, Kathryn Hunter and David Cano, to call on Tara Wicker, the Mayor and other officials with no response to help prevent this intrusion they will be forced to work around the fence and cancel the Fall show.

Ephemeral Gallery also hosted 2009′s Surrealist Ball, REVO, UncommonThread and several other smaller art shows. When exhibit space is so seldom to come by this kind of neglect to work on behalf of art supporters is extremely unfortunate.

Check out this article on local Baton Rouge talent, artist Dawn Black. In full disclosure CultureCandy’s Erin Rolfs did write the article but it also provides a glimpse at the latest Art Melt juror Andrea Pollan who exhibited Black’s work at her micro gallery, The Curator’s Office in Washington D.C. To read the article click here, you can also see more of Black’s work at her website or visit the Curator’s Office.

The Gentleman Dragon by Dawn Black

 (We got this notice from a friend and thought we’d share!)

One of the first of it's kind Man with a Movie Camera

If you have time today, please call or e-mail state Sen. Sharon Weston Broome and ask her to support House Bill 787 called the “LOUISIANA FILMMAKERS GRANT PROGRAM”. With the session winding down, it is important that she hears from you indie film lovers.

If amended, the bill would allow the state’s Film Office to use the fees it collects when it transfers tax credits to production companies to set up a FUND for small film grants.

Right now, these fees are not being used for anything…Let’s ask that they be put to good use!

As proposed, it would be a 50/50 match of funds up to $100,000. This will give area filmmakers the opportunity to double their budgets.

I believe this is a great way to help grow an indigenous film industry, to foster our creative culture, to keep our talented young and independent filmmakers in the state, and to create new job opportunities for local actors, artists and crew working in independent film.

CONTACT: Sharon Weston Broome # 225-342-2040 (Capitol Office), #225-359-9352 (District Office), lasen15@legis.state.la.us

Please ask any other filmmakers, actors, crew or friends you know to contact Broome or their district’s senator as well. It takes 5 minutes but could make a big difference in our state.

BRASS’S (Baton Rouge Advocates for Safe Streets) Velo Louisiane the first annual I HEART BIKES event celebrates all forms of “human powered cycling” Saturday and Sunday, April 10 – 11. And in true Louisiana fashion it promise to be a party. Day-long events at BREC City Park throughout the weekend and an art show at Ephemeral Gallery Saturday night pay tribute to the eco-friendly, 193 year-old invention.

According to BRASS’s website significant strides have been made in the state arena for the support of bicycling:

GO TO http://www.brsafestreets.org/velo-louisiane-baton-rouge to find out more!

Forum 35′s ever sensational Art Melt issues a call for entries for its 7th year running. Just think, the minimal age entrant, 18 years-old, was in sixth grade when competition debuted 2003!  In a surprising turn of events, for the juried show that has never been short of drama, the exhibition will be housed at the Louisiana State Museum instead of the Shaw Center. The much larger exhibit space will no doubt be more conducive to actually seeing the art work and handling the ample crowd. Forum 35 coordinators are also offering a more centralized camp ground for marketplace vendors. If the Baton Rouge Book Festival is any indication this move should be advantageous for Art Melt. Nonetheless there are some constants, Susan Brunner will continue to curate the show (despite having also moved from the Shaw Center), the preview party is slated July 15 and multiple juror process is still part of the gig (no word on who the jurors are just yet).

In an ideal world attendees could shuttle up and down 3rd and 4th Streets effortlessly enjoying the ambiance of the Shaw and LSM in one evening.   And who knows, that may be in the cards. As for now interested artists should submit their work no later than June 2, access to the online entry form is here.