Bi-Annual Program VBKÖ May 2021- May 2023

VBKÖ – Vereinigung bildender Künstlerinnen Österreichs/
Austrian Association of Women Artists invites you to send in a
proposal for our two-year program running from May 2021 to May 2023.

THE PORTAL 

Historically, pandemics have forced humans to break with the past and imagine their world anew. This one is no different. It is a portal, a gateway between one world and the next. We can choose to walk through it, dragging the carcasses of our prejudice and hatred, our avarice, our data banks and dead ideas, our dead rivers and smoky skies behind us. Or we can walk through lightly, with little luggage, ready to imagine another world. And ready to fight for it. – Arundhati Roy: The Pandemic as a Portal 

The iconic portal at Maysedergasse is the sole remaining eye witness of the VBKÖ’s history that has existed since 1910 and has thus experienced a myriad of difficult, celebratory, historic, empowering, and entertaining moments. We define this golden door as a portal that can be a starting point, a threshold, a wormhole, a gateway; it can stand for new beginnings, time and space travel, change, access, virtual realities, gatekeeping, role play, transformation, a means of passage, progress, transitioning, or ultimately an ending. The VBKÖ is welcoming exhibition proposals that critically investigate the portal in its diverse meanings and moreover why gates might be open to some and closed for others; projects that imagine realities beyond its physical framework, or that highlight characters that are ready to fight for “another world”—past/present/future.  

As a queer-feminist association, we have an equal responsibility to work towards a future that ensures feminist principles within VBKÖ’s upcoming exhibition and public programming such as actively fighting against trans-exclusionary radical feminism, allowing for dissent, opinions, critique, ugly feelings, and different truths, an awareness of the power dynamics of language,the awareness of privilege, and the importance of a caring and supportive community and more, and recognize the reverbrance of a contemporary feminist outlook in other movements internationally. 

We welcome group proposals for exhibition projects, screenings, performances, workshops, lectures and other artistic practices (we don’t support solo shows or individual presentation formats!).

What we require from you is:

1. a short description of the project (max. 1 page)
2. a short CV/ Biography from all participants involved in the proposal (max. 1 page)
3. a financial plan (max. 2000 Euro)
4. technical requirements
5. envisioned schedule of the proposed project (between 2021 to 2023), and which quarter of the year (January- April, May- August, September- December).
6. three high resolution images
7. a designated contact person’s information (email /mobile number)

Please take note of the requirements, incomplete applications will not be considered.

Deadline: 01.10.2020, 23:59

Please send all your materials via a single PDF (max 5MB) to  opencall@vbkoe.org or mail / deliver to our address: VBKÖ Maysedergasse 2/28, 1010 Vienna (received by 01.10.2020)