CONTEMPORARY ART MUSEUM ST. LOUIS AND
THE GATEWAY FOUNDATION ANNOUNCE A CALL TO ARTISTS
FOR THE GREAT RIVERS BIENNIAL 2010

The Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis is pleased to announce the 2010 Great Rivers Biennial: Three Regional Artists will be Selected to Receive Grants of $20,000 and a Major Exhibition at the Contemporary

Applications must be postmarked by August 15, 2009

In collaboration with the Gateway Foundation, the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis—committed to energizing the spirit of the art scene in St. Louis—conceived the Great Rivers Biennial Visual Arts Awards Program to provide St. Louis-based artists with a platform to the national art world. The goal of this innovative awards program is to identify artists working in St. Louis, at all levels of their careers, and provide them with financial assistance, create a broader visibility of their work in both the Midwest and national arts communities, and provide professional support from visiting critics, curators, and dealers. For the fourth Great Rivers Biennial, as many as three artists will be selected by a panel of distinguished jurors to receive a grant of $20,000 each and the opportunity to exhibit at the Contemporary.

Submissions will be accepted beginning June 1, 2009. Artists can submit work from any of the following categories: drawing, painting, photography, film and video, printmaking, sculpture, installation, mixed media, and multi-media. To be eligible for participation in the program, artists must reside in the metro area, including St. Louis City and the counties of Saint Louis, Jefferson, and St. Charles in Missouri, or St. Clair and Madison counties in Illinois, for at least one year prior to the application deadline, August 15, 2009.

The jurors for the Great Rivers Biennial 2010 are Douglas Fogle, Chief Curator and Deputy Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles; Melissa Franklin, Director of the Pew Fellowship in the Arts, Philadelphia; and, Laura Steward, Phillips Director of SITE Santa Fe, New Mexico. Jurors will review all submissions that meet the eligibility requirements and will select up to three artists meeting the biennial’s criteria.

The Great Rivers Biennial winners will produce new work for a April 2010 exhibition that occupies the entirety of the Contemporary’s Main Galleries.

ELIGIBILITY
Please review carefully

• You must currently reside in the St. Louis metropolitan area, including St. Louis City, and the Missouri counties of Saint Louis, Jefferson and St. Charles, and the Illinois counties of St. Clair and Madison.
• You must have resided in the St. Louis metropolitan area from August 2008 and continue to reside in the St. Louis metropolitan area until August 2010.
• You must be willing to participate in the April 2010 winners exhibition at the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis.
• Your work must fall within the areas of drawing, painting, photography, film and video, printmaking, sculpture, installation, mixed media, and/or multi-media.
• You must have an active email account. All communication will be through email.
• Degree-seeking students (undergraduate or graduate) may apply.
• Artists at all levels of their careers may apply.
• Previous winners of the Great Rivers Biennial are not eligible to submit their work again.

APPLICATION
Applications must be postmarked by August 15, 2009
Images and Format

• Please submit exactly eight (8) images of work. Any additional images will not be reviewed or considered.
• Submit only work that will be available for, or is similar
  in style to new work that will be created for the culminating exhibition in April 2010.
• Images must be submitted by CD-ROM.
• Images must be in JPEG format. Images must be no larger
  than 8 x 10 inches at 300 dpi and should be RGB.
• Images should be oriented correctly and placed in the order in which you want them to be viewed.
• Label the exterior of the CD with your name and the date.
• Submit a word document that includes complete credit lines for each image (your name, date, title of work, medium, and dimensions).
• Do not send original materials or print images.
• For video or multi-media work, please submit an excerpt of
  5 minutes in DVD format. For web, please provide a link. For all
  other multi-media works, QuickTime or PowerPoint is required.

Résumé/CV and Statement

• Submit a two-page résumé/CV and a one-page statement about your current work and the new work you will be making during the grant period. Include home and studio addresses, email addresses and phone numbers.
• Include participation in exhibitions and awards or scholarships received to date.
• Do not send additional materials (e.g. catalogs or articles).

Please Note: The Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis will not accept original or hard file materials such as slides, press clippings, books, or reviews. Please do not send these materials as they will not be returned, nor will these items be taken into consideration for winner selection.

To download a pdf of the call click here.

SUBMISSION
Great Rivers Biennial 2010
Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis
3750 Washington Boulevard
St. Louis, MO 63108
All Great Rivers Biennial correspondence will be done through email at greatrivers@camstl.org.

The Great Rivers Biennial is generously supported by the Gateway Foundation.

General support for the Contemporary’s exhibitions program is generously provided by the Whitaker Foundation; The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts; William E. Weiss Foundation; Nancy Reynolds and Dwyer Brown; Regional Arts Commission; Missouri Arts Council, a state agency; Arts and Education Council; and members of the Contemporary Art Museum
St. Louis.

THE GREAT RIVERS BIENNIAL PROGRAM

The Great Rivers Biennial Visual Awards Program is a collaboration between the Contemporary and the Gateway Foundation, established in 2003 with a mission to strengthen and support the local artists of St. Louis. The goal of this program is to identify talented emerging and mid-career local artists, provide them financial assistance, raise the visibility of their work in both the Midwest and national arts community, and provide them with the professional support of visiting critics, curators, and dealers.

The Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis and the Gateway Foundation are committed to energizing the spirit of the art scene in St. Louis and feel the Great Rivers Biennial Awards Program does just that by providing emerging artists with a tremendous platform to the national art world. As many as three artists will be selected by a panel of nationally recognized jurors to receive a grant of $20,000 each and the invaluable opportunity to exhibit at the Contemporary. With the exhibition space provided by the Contemporary, the Great Rivers Biennial program hopes to raise the visibility of the artists’ work by providing them with professional support from visiting critics, curators, and dealers, as well as connecting the artists to the St. Louis public. The program is generously funded by the Gateway Foundation.

The inaugural Great Rivers Biennial was in 2004. Past winners include Juan William Chávez, Jill Downen, Corey Escoto, Adam Frelin, Kim Humphries, Moses, Michelle Oosterbaan, Matthew Strauss, and Jason Wallace Triefenbach. The distinguished jurors for the past Great Rivers Biennial include Cheryl Brutvan, Curator of Contemporary Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Lisa Corrin, Director, Williams College Museum of Art, Elizabeth Dunbar, Curator at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City; Gary Garrels, Chief Curator and Deputy Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs at the UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Heidi Zuckerman Jacobson, Director and Chief Curator of the Aspen Art Museum in Colorado; Helen Molesworth, Curator of Contemporary Art at the Harvard University Art Museums, Debra Singer, Executive Director and Chief Curator, The Kitchen; Lilian Tone, Assistant Curator of the Department of Painting and Sculpture at The Museum of Modern Art, New York; and Hamza Walker, Education Director, Renaissance Society at the University of Chicago.