19. SURVIVAL Art Review – OPEN CALL
You ain’t going nowhere – an open call for art projects 19TH SURVIVAL ART REVIEW
We invite you to submit proposals of art projects for the 19th edition of SURVIVAL Art Review, which will take place from 25 to 29 June 2021 in the boiler room of the former Pafawag factory (previously Linke-Hofmann-Werke). You ain’t going nowhere is the slogan to which the proposed applications should refer.
22.12.2020–14.02.2021
You ain’t going nowhere
Kotłownia, ul. Fabryczna 14, Wrocław
Making plans for 2021 from the perspective of a prolonged isolation, various forms of social quarantine and with the awareness of the unpredictability of the situation, we try to see the impact and changes these events may have, not only on our ad-hoc functioning in the future, but also how they will affect us in the long-term. One of the many pillars of social life, so far undisputed and violently verified by the COVID-19 pandemic, is the identification of freedom and the right to movement.
The year 2020 drastically interrupted the European episode of free movement of people in the Schengen zone, returning to the questions about the importance of national borders and their usefulness in managing the crises, not only biological, but also social and these pertaining to identity. Not leaving and staying in one place has turned out not to be a choice, but a necessary way of life founded upon remaining in an exceedingly shrinking field. Acceptance of the limited freedom of movement in the name of protecting life outlines an area of inquiry into redefining and re-evaluating what “here and now” might mean.
From this obligation to stay put – which for many of us meant sitting in front of the screen for weeks – and from this claustrophobically diminishing life space – be it closed airports or florists – a question arises about a new understanding of the local. What we recently begun to see as a conscious choice in terms of the care for environment and sustainable production has rapidly evolved into an oppressive and necessary immediacy. One of the pandemic transformations of our lives is how we begin to experience, perceive and define our immediate surroundings, both from an individual and social points of view.
Until recently, mobility – understood as cosmopolitanism, flexibility, travel and dynamism – was one of the expressions of social and also artistic positions. From the perspective of the art world, networking and being everywhere constituted the preconditions for success, and belonging in different places and contexts was one of the elements of building visibility and symbolic capital. Such dynamism of building relationships and functioning is questioned not only because in isolation it seems to make little difference whether the interlocutor seen on the screen is a street or a continent away. Stillness turns out to be a new way of functioning.
In the past, one of Europe’s largest factories of machinery and carriages, now under transformation into services and residential area, the buildings and the history of Pafawag offer an important context for the slogan “You ain’t going nowhere.” The space, can be understood both as a trace of a different regime of production and direction of development, as well as a literal study of the history of mobility.
While these are important contexts, we do not intend the exhibition in 2021 to be strictly devoted to Pafawag itself. When submitting a proposal, we ask you to take into account the character of the available spaces; due to the large volume of open spaces and the difficulty in separating a room for individual projects, we are interested in site-specific proposals that take a close look at the particular place. We also consider displaying art projects outside of the building.
We are waiting for your application until February 14 at the following address: kontakt@survival.art.pl
