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Submission Info Session: Otter Voice Meeting Notes

Submission Info Session

The New Gallery1h 14min

Speaker 1

21:41

All right. It is now 109 I think just to make sure we're respectful of everyone's time we can start now. This is going to be recorded and then posted on to our website. So I'm going to start recording now

Speaker 1

22:09

All right. Hello, everyone. Welcome to our info session for our call for submissions. I encourage everyone to get comfortable, have water, be cozy, maybe have a snack. Just ask that everyone remains muted until we get to the questions later at the end of this presentation. Feel free to like write them down or put them in the chat. We'll go through them. I'm also joined by Winona who is the communications outreach and digital programmer here at the new gallery. And my name is Jasmine. I'm a programming co director at TPG. Yeah, there's also a link to otter AI captions. So if you need to read there's a bonus. Feel free to leave your camera's on or off. It's totally fine. Whatever is best for you. And with that, I'll just start off by giving a little light acknowledgement. Even though they feel a little weird and formative it's also weird when they don't happen. So tng is gratefully on is a gratefully acknowledges its home on traditional territories of the people of the treaty seven region of southern Alberta. This includes the Niitsitapi (inclusive of the Siksika, Piikani, and Kainai First Nations), the Tsuut’ina First Nation, and the Iyarhe Nakoda (including the Chiniki, Bearspaw, and Wesley First Nations). The City of Calgary is also home to the historic Northwest Métis and to the Otipemisiwak Métis Government, Métis Nation Battle River Territory, Nose Hill Métis District 5 and Elbow Métis District 6. TNG would also like to acknowledge the many other First Nations, Métis and Inuit who have crossed this land for generations, as well as Indigenous peoples across Turtle Island who have stewarded and protected this land for generations, and who continue to do so today. With that, so like a very small introduction for myself I have been working at the new gallery for two years now. And I mainly focus on programming so I organize exhibitions and projects and work with artists here along with Winona and as well as our third staff, Alexa, who is the other co director. Oh, yeah. And I'll also introduce the new gallery if you aren't as familiar with us or if you haven't worked a lot with artists and centers. So the new gallery or the also Carl's call ourselves tng. We are experienced that was established in 1975. We've been through a few different names. We were the clouds and water gallery and Visual Production society. And then we were off the off center center. And then finally video gallery. We've been in Chinatown in Calgary since 2013. Just off Center Street. If you're familiar with Calgary and we're just kind of by the Center Street Bridge, by the river. Yeah, so I created this info session, to be a guide and a space for artists and curators and workers to ask questions, get more knowledge and hopefully learn a lot about submissions. i One of the big things about this call for submissions is I really want everyone to dream big. Express your ideas and like really go for it. I really hope that everyone can gain competence, experience and feel good about submission process even though it is hard and maybe a little scary. So yeah, I will have we will go through our mandates, the submission materials that you will be needing, how they will be evaluated by the jury of peers and some information about outreach programming opportunities. And just like any little tips about your session, so yeah. And with that, let's move on to a little bit about the new gallery mandate.

Speaker 1

27:15

And this is a little bit about the new gallery. So tng is mandated to provide opportunities and venues for artists that foster social and political art practices, while engaging and educating adult audiences through artists, culture and contemporary art. So it's, we're kind of like in a interesting space of being kind of specific, but also pretty open to many different ideas and artists. I think it's really important when crafting your submission to really maybe like, question or figure out what about your proposal or your our practice aligns with that mandate. So always making sure that we're talking about your work. Being able to explain by maybe your proposal is has the intent or spirit of like, fostering social political art practice or how you engage with audiences maybe education is really important and maybe the different components activate different parts of the mandate. Yeah, I will look and it'll come up again throughout this session of how you could you might be able to do that. And there's a little picture put in of our front so we have a nice big window, a big billboard, sign that hosts art as well. And there's lots of pictures all over our website. So just like look around.

Speaker 1

29:06

I also wanted to highlight that the new gallery specifically a nonprofit artists from space, that means myself Winona and Alexa are all artists and work within arts we all have practices on the size of this arts administration that we do here. And yeah, the other thing of that is if you are a commercial, we are if you are interested in commercial art, we do not facilitate any sales. So if that is something that's really important to you, it I just don't expect that we will sell art with you. If someone is interested in your art in that way. Of course we like to connect artists with them but we don't work on any Commission's or sell anything for you. Yeah. And then with that, I just want to tell you a little bit about the spaces that we have these are all the physical spaces at the new gallery. So we as I mentioned before, we have a billboard it is called billboard 208. This space is bover storefront as you can see, this work here is by Brady Fullerton. Business as usual, which was documenting Calgary floods in 2013. You can read about it on our website if you like. But um we switch it out to about two times a year and it's usually a curated space I'm always kind of taking suggestions. So sometimes if, if a submission doesn't quite fit the criteria of the main space, there's a possibility that it could end up as a billboard. So just maybe keep that in mind or like if you are interested in the billboard space, you can email me about it. You can talk about it. And then our other space, our main space, which is where we'll be hosting our exhibitions and is this call for submissions is about is a downstairs wheelchair accessible space. The exact dimensions are on our website with a floor plan it includes a washroom fridge like the office space, hardwood floors and white walls and 11 and a half foot ceilings. And then this is just documentation from a show from a year ago by Carlos Killeen. And, but it's also on our website if you want to check it out. And then our third physical space is our resource center. This is an upstairs space so it's not wheelchair accessible. It has a also a gender neutral washroom. It's our office space as well. As the place where we put our archives periodicals and a library that we are working on our hope their futures to invite more people to like their do research work or just be able to use it as like a meeting flex space or something like that. But if you're curious about the resource center, you can also email us about it and you can share different things. There's a lot of cool stuff but we are like organizing it it's also a place where we host workshops or events sometimes.

Speaker 1

33:05

Next we're gonna cover the submission guidelines and criteria. There's a lot of information here. So try not to be feel too overwhelmed. You'll have a lot of time to reflect on it. We're still about a month away from the submission deadline. So write down your questions if you have any. Or if you have any of that show up later. Email me or give us a call. So the guidelines can be found at the new gallery.org/submit as well as the link to the Google Form that you will submit your actual package on. So your submission package will include the following materials in a single PDF file. That is your exhibition or project proposal, which is about 500 words and then an artist or curatorial statement, again, same length and then images around 10 images you can do last if you feel like that is sufficient. also accept links to video and audio. And then just like a little, maybe a list or a couple of sentences about your technical requirements. It kind of depends on your submission. And how involved maybe and then ending that off with your CV, a max of two pages. I'll just go through these in like a few notes that are specifically for each of them. So your exhibition or project proposal is probably the most important or like the best way to wrap up everything to a cohesive idea. Your idea your exhibition proposal should be able to connect your artist statement. The space like how you envision with exhibition is in the space how it connects to the mandate and it should offer a lot of clarity on your ideas. So I would suggest writing in plain language assuming that people might not know or don't assume knowledge of the jurors. So make sure that you're clear and make sure that basically anyone can understand your ideas. Another good idea is maybe like give it to a friend and but if they envision what from what you've written or said to them, and then your artist statement is really about like the work itself. Your ideas and research behind it and like relating it again to the mandate. I think always coming back to that as maybe your Cornerstone is like how this has to do with like the new gallery, like whether it's like where the new gallery is and Chinatown where we are in consists like on the confluence for like, what sort of communities you're interested in, like how does it relate to the space and what is important to new gallery which is social, and political and education, all that those different facets. It's really important to also speak for yourself and like, avoid making really large sweeping statements about people in general or like assuming your opinion or ideas or like facts is really important to just like, come at it from your perspective. And yeah, avoid too many general these generalizations and then make sure to include how your statement this is in general. Any gallery you're applying to you like how it applies to that specific space or that specific call. If you have any questions about that email, always email the person that is taking submissions and then for your images or documentation or video. Images can be a lot of different things. So it can be the actual proposed work that is glinted that you want to be in the show. It can be drawing or sketches of plans. of things that are in progress or will be made. It can also be documentation of maybe like workshops or events that you've done that are part of your practice or the practice of what you're writing. About. And then it could also be worth that is like the most recent that is in line with the proposal. So if you've made like 10 for shirts or something if you made like 10 artworks that kind of you want to work off of and are going to expand upon you can include some of those as well. If you're like unsure about anything, I'm happy to offer advice and if our video and sound works. They can be however late but the jury will only really had time for maybe five minutes of that since you could be reviewed enough to make 100 submissions and that is a lot of time for people so also make sure that your link is either public, or you shared the password with us so that it's accessible to the jurors. And if I will be double checking links before any jurors see them, but it is just very helpful. If they are all in working order, test it with some friends if you need to. And then the next category is the technical requirements. This doesn't need to be super long. And it is also subject to change upon either funding or like what's available. But basically it's really helpful to kind of have a general budget of what to expect for this show. This budget and include, like production costs it can include a grant that you've pursuing or already have. It's this like good just for estimating. It shows that you've put like thought into like what this will look like and helps us understand the feasibility of the project or proposal. And then also including maybe like a list or a couple sentences about actual physical maybe tools or things you need. The new gallery does like have some we have a lot of tools we have a lot of like installation of equipment. We have some TV screens, and speakers and lights and stuff like that. Anything a little bit more complicated than that definitely needs to be rented. Or borrowed or purchased with a grant. Again, I'm happy to go over that on individual cases if needed. I've noticed that there has been a trend or maybe like a lot of artists are working with AR or VR. And we don't have like a ton of equipment to accommodate that. So artists or curators, I suggest you be creative and figuring out how to get supplies like VR headsets. Or like special screens and stuff like that. And then yeah, email us to ask if we have certain things because I'm happy to give that information. And then if you're unsure if the gallery you're applying to has equipment you need it is that is the part that is helpful to put into your budget for either renting or purchasing. This, this is also hopefully helpful if you are applying to grants that you can just like rework this proposal and put it into that proposal. It's always nice to have kind of a skeleton or base of proposals that you can then tailor to different things like grants, other galleries, residencies, all of those things. Lastly, is the CV, so I really want to

Speaker 1

42:58

make sure that people know that like you do not have to have vast amount of CV credits or experience for your submission to be successful. You know, I know especially for emerging artists that it might feel like really difficult to submit a see you and there's only like a page or like five lines of work that you've been able to put on there. I think like if you're nervous about it, maybe look about look at your CV as another way to kind of share who you are and what's important to you and make sure the things that are on it are like in line with areas of interest in research that are important or like show how it what it Yeah, just show what's important to you. See, these are also the last thing that we will be looking at. It's usually is usually not the like, for most important thing. It really just is to support and supplement everything else that you've already put in. So if you have any anxieties or worries about your CV, ask friends look up other artists TVs feel free to email us. Yeah, hopefully news part is not too daunting for you I also want to go through verbal submissions. So we have been accepting of verbal submissions for a few years now but there's never been any kind of advice or guidelines for it. So your verbal submissions should be recorded and sent as a video link that you don't have to show yourself on video. It can just be voice. It can be video to whatever feels the most authentic and good for you. So there should be no longer than 10 minutes long. They will include all the like heaviest writing proponents like your proposal, your artist statement or technical requirements. Those three things I suggest including pictures if you can include them in your video just like the pictures that you have submit in the PDF. Also, if you're not sure how to record or submit a video, I suggest doing it through zoom like this. You can share your screen with the pictures that you want to share and then record your voice. You can be in it or not. And then you can take that recording, edit it if you need to put it on YouTube. Or Vimeo and make sure you have like a microphone like your headphones or something. The one thing about the verbal submissions is that you will still need to submit like a short CV and if you don't include pictures in your video, you can also include them in the PDF might be helpful for jurors to be able to access the video and then look at the images at the same time. Things like that. If you have any questions about verbal submissions, happy to go through it with you. If you have any technical questions, I can try my very best to help you. I want to make it as easy as possible. And then that's just one other thing that we haven't really shared before is the actual criteria or scoring that the jury will be using for submissions. So it's a little bit out of order. We'll do that first. Okay, submission criteria. Adherence to the mandate, as I've said before, is one of the most important things in your submission that is scored on a yes or no basis. And submissions that receive a unanimous no to adherence will not be scored on the rest of the criteria. They will just be omitted from scoring. And then the rest. They're all separately out of 10 the first is usability. So feasibility will cover things like does this budget make sense? Can I see this proposal? Does this proposal have any? Like are there needs that like absolutely cannot be covered by tng. Things like that. Clarity is also like do we fully understand the way that the proposal is set up? Is it can we like envision this in the gallery? Does it make sense like am I left with questions about how it will be? artistic merit is a very subjective term but we've kind of classified it or identified it as artistic excellence in ideas and like are they innovative is the craft of the work. Excellent. Is is the artwork conveying exactly what the artist statement and proposal are inviting us to think about? And then lastly is community impact. Community Impact can be a lot of different things. jurors will be looking at communities in different ways as like the community surrounding us. The historic community they Chinatown. Our position here in Mohkinstsis treaty seven, our relationship is like the land around us. It could be with other artists. It could be actual community events like workshops or talks or tours. The community can look like a lot of things. It's also like how impact the community impact on the artists themselves. There's a lot of different ways to think about it. If you want to chat about it again, I am around. Right now. Go back. One other thing I really wanted to highlight in this round of call for submissions is our outreach programming. So we've been encouraging artists to do a lot of fun and important are like out of the box public programmings past year, so two years since I started. So we've done some really fun things like picnics and performances. You may have been to or heard of shed from 2022 by Pam Tzeng. And that was a picnic and a performance and an artist talk. It doesn't have to be that big but that's kind of gives you an idea of the scope of things that might be interesting or fun. We've also done workshops with Christina Yao, who is a curatorial resident. And she now like works with us doing translations. But she's done workshops with Clover living which is an old folks living community here in Chinatown. They've done really cool things like tours of exhibitions, they've come to other workshops lately. Kev Liang was show that was in January and at the end of the show it closed in March. There was a screen printing event where we had tote bags we had you're invited to like bring your own shirt if there's paper. It was really cool and fun. There was also a fish tanning workshop with Morgan Possberg last fall, which was really cool. There's a photo of it here. It was making fish leather. So like there's a lot of possibility and I really hope that applicants are excited by that and like are interested in that. Um, again, the world is your oyster. And if you have like something that you're passionate about, don't be afraid to like express your ideas and dreams. It also doesn't have to be fully fleshed out. The nature of outreach programming is that it kind of needs to be flexible because different things

Speaker 1

52:56

impede on all the time. Like you never know when there's gonna be a COVID outbreak. Or if you need to switch it up and do it online or if you can't have it as big as you'd like you could. But yeah, just like be be open to that kind of programming as well.

Speaker 1

53:27

Yeah, lastly, I'll just go with these are kind of the key takeaways I outlined. For this. though. I've said this many times relate your submission to the new gallery's mandate. That should be like your number one. Make sure your application is really clear and easy to read or understand. Reflect on the criteria that I laid out. always kind of been researching grants or residencies whenever you can. I don't know a lot about the ones outside of Berta but I'm happy to like make suggestions if I can and then um, if you're ever unsure feel uneasy about something please just like us. asked me about it. Yeah. All right. It was like a lot of information and a lot of different things but I'll open it up to questions. You can either raise your hand and then like a mute or you can type it in the chat. I think there's a few in the chat. Okay. I'll start off with Hara should outreach ideas be included in the submission? Yes, you can. And like doesn't absolutely have to be in there. But if you were doing it, I would put it into the proposal section and mentioned that you're interested in it. And if you have any ideas or and then Celia you can unmute and ask.

Speaker 2

55:24

Alright, thanks. So I have a I have a specific idea for curating an ecologically themed exhibit and one of the pieces, at least one of the pieces possibly more but one that I've personally worked on would propose to arrange with somebody proxy on location to help with like a list of the materials for this piece to install and the whole concept being with this too

Speaker 2

56:27

not incur the environmental impacts of shipping materials or like artist transport you know onto site from being located outside of the province. So I understand that there's not maybe yet hopefully it's gonna be in development in the CARFAC framework. Anything that's, you know, specifically attentive to this. But I'm, I guess I'm wondering about thoughts on a possibility of perhaps proposing as an alternative use to travel funds like kind of coming up with a budget estimate of like, where the equivalent costs are estimated to land and see if it would be. Yeah, I guess I guess the question is, Does it seem Do you think that there is even a logistical possibility of like, I guess it would involve an accepted you know, artists or curating team to hire somebody who may or may not be already associated working with your artists run space to do some of the actual like fabrication and install work.

Speaker 1

58:08

Okay, yeah, I think I think you could definitely find CARFAC equivalents or maybe like ones that kind of fit what you're looking for. So maybe it would be like an assistant or probably under professional fees. Like a I think there's like an installation. Be, but might make sense for that kind of thing. That does sound like something that would be most helpful if you could secure funding for it. But there is like a production budget line within like, the new gallery's budget. So like, often when I am planning like an exhibition with artists, we kind of like to do a plan A and a plan B. So one is like if there is secured funding from a grant or something like that, and then one where there is an option that is just tng funded, which means the budget is a lot lower. Exhibitions tend to cost like four to five or $6,000. So having that in mind is good. I hope I answered that question. Yeah. Thank you. Start reading. Yeah, I see a second questions. By visa. Isn't that right? Is it okay to submit an outreach idea that's completely unrelated to the exhibition proposal? Um, it kind of depends on what you mean by unrelated like, I I think it does kind of need to be related to the themes, but I think that's really flexible and creative. So for example, we have an exhibition coming up this week. At Jonie Cheung. Her her work is really about like, social practice, and there's a lot of different elements within that. So the main exhibition is using these Good morning towels that were lent out and then she's washing them and then we're displaying them in the gallery but her outreach event is going to be a snack tour in Chinatown, where everyone gathers to talk about snacks found here. So they're both like very community related, both very centered on Chinatown. And like, during his artists practices very much like Chinese diaspora and like immigrant experiences. So like, if that makes sense, like you can kind of like you can can you can make a lot of connections in different ways. But I guess, do make sure that there is connections. Then I see a question from Miranda. Do we need to make an image list explaining the images I did not include an image list. I think when you put in your images, maybe you can put in like a title. Or if you like or like say that like this was a work in progress or this is a sketch. I'll leave that up to you to applicants to decide what is most appropriate if there's any more questions about image list or like images, feel free to raise your hand or pop them in the chat. When would it be possible to be sent a copy of this slideshow? Yeah, as Winona said this is being recorded and will be posted on our websites. I can also upload the slide as a PDF if that's like helpful it's because it's nice to just look at the writing and then I have the next question. Climate Hi, I'm Jasmine. I'm from BC should I be applying for funding from the BC Arts Council or Alberta Foundation for the Arts? I believe you'd be applying for BC Arts Council. I would double check the AFA eligibility but if I remember I think you have to be an Alberta resident or working with Alberta. I would double check that but I think you'd have more luck with BC Arts Council. Another question from Jen. She had the submission include an exhibition proposal and an outreach program outreach programming is optional. Like sometimes artists are just not going to have like the capacity to do that in addition to like a whole exhibition. So that's why it's not outlined as like a strict thing that you need to have. I just think it's a really fun and creative opportunity for artists to have and to like making sure that there's that support for that. I'm gonna take it as a case by case basis. So like if you have a question or unsure about that, talk to me about it.

Speaker 1

01:04:16

We have another question. What are things that the TNG exhibition budget cannot be used for? So the majority of the budget goes to artists fees. Travel for installation and accommodations for the time that you're in Calgary. And then it goes to like the outreach programming like your artist presentation fee, which is $500 updated with corfac I think it'll probably be like 520 And then probably more after that, by the time this exhibition has happened. There's there's a lot of fluidity in the budget. Depending on like so many factors like if you have accommodations in Calgary already, like if you're maybe you have family that lives here or friends that live here that you can stay there then like you can move some of your accommodation budget to production. I think any hard nose or probably like if you wanted to bring someone with you like they need to pay for their own flight, like and probably their own accommodations if they need it. Stuff like that, but it's an ongoing kind of conversation. If your exhibition is selected. We'll talk a lot about budget and like expectations

Speaker 1

01:05:55

yeah another how many exhibitions get accepted for the year for a year. tng has five exhibitions a year right now they are seven weeks long. We usually are programmed two years out to be in accordance with our own operating grants. So for this round of submissions, we're probably going to be accepting around eight or nine exhibitions, which will probably bring us into the very end of 2026 maybe even to the very beginning of 2027. Last year, we also had about I think it was 75 or 78 submissions. In total and we selected seven of them.

Speaker 1

01:06:55

Taylor, would it be possible. Oh, yeah. That was another slide show. This budget include installation or does tng pay for installation separately. So installation is very DIY. It's usually myself, other tng staff and the artist or curator installing the show. If you have like more you have high installation needs and need to hire. Hire like a another art tech but definitely is something that you should be like trying to pursue a grant for. So usually you and me with hammers and ladders i there. There's a lot of great artists in Calgary though that I've gotten to learn. Learning more than you take Do you have any advice for group proposes? Yeah, sure. Historically, group proposals or like group shows have been probably around it's like three to five artists within our spaces, not huge. So I recommend really looking at our floorplan and like making sure that the work and the group proposal is gonna fit how you want to

Speaker 1

01:08:40

and then also like group exhibitions require a lot. A lot of there's a lot of moving parts. There's a lot of people to get on the same page. A lot of people to communicate with so making sure that you kind of have that kind of relationship set up and like really strong and you like, you know, go work really well, I think is important. If you have any other specific questions about group proposals, please let me know. And then just like another question about install, like installing projectors, myself, and Winona and Alexa have installed projectors a few times. Now we've done it on the ceiling. We've done it on the wall. We've had them on Flint's we've done it a few times. So it's it's hard. It's a tricky one, but we've done it and it's good.

Question asker

01:09:52

I would love to take a look at your equipment list. It would help with protesting the budget. Should I send an email about that? Yes, yeah, email me and I'll send you a specific list. But I think what I will also do after today is put a list of equipment that we have on the guidelines so that so that people are very clear about it

Speaker 1

01:10:30

again, we have we have about three working short throw projectors. We have one, regular one we have ceiling and wall mounts for them. We have a smallest assortment of plants and the TNG floorplan you can see outlets you can see the track lighting we have I believe we have two tracks going perpendicular in the space. We have all like all the other like kind of hardware things we got nails, screws, saws, hammers, drills. We have all that kind of stuff, but I'll make the list for

Speaker 1

01:11:22

there any other questions or anything else I can help you with?

Speaker 1

01:11:36

All right but I'm glad it was informative for everyone. I reiterate that like I am available via email. We could set up a Zoom meeting you can call me. My office hours are Wednesday to Saturday 10am to 6pm I'm most available in the afternoon because I'm asleep the person

Speaker 1

01:12:09

Oh, yeah. Um, I also did an info session in 2022. During our last call for submissions, there is a mock submission it is a little bit different because there is a little bit of a different process but it still might be helpful to look at. There's things like a floor plan that shows that you can like draw on it and map things out. I highly recommend looking at that. Submission as well. And yeah, we're gonna send the link info session is on the website. It's in our toolkit page. Yeah. Thank you everyone for coming. And I look forward to seeing everybody submissions. Oh, quick question about CD. When editing down a longer CV when is the most disposable content, older exhibitions, locations media professionals mediations. As a good question, I think. I think older exhibitions makes sense. Like, if you have a lot, I would definitely put the ones that were maybe most impactful on you or your career, or like really highlight the work that you want to show right now. All right. I will stay on for like another minute in case anyone has any questions and they were feeling shy or something. Thank you all for coming. I also my email is Jasmine J S and i ne at the new gallery.org

Jasmine

01:13:54

Thank you goodbye everyone.

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