Visual Arts Explores the Relationship between Art and Communities

Banff Centre Visual Arts Programs Explore the Relationship between Art and Communities in 2020.

BANFF, AB, January 31, 2019 – Visual Arts at Banff Centre continues to offer exceptional programs and opportunities for emerging and professional artists, curators, art critics and researchers. Programs offered in 2020 feature a dynamic roster of faculty, artists, programs, public events and exhibitions exploring the unique and diverse role art plays within local, national, and international communities in which we live and practice.

“Through the visual arts programs offered at Banff Centre, we encourage each artist to express their unique history and experience through their chosen medium,”

“The outcomes of collaboration and the transformative and experimental work that happens here develops the practice and ultimately the careers of the artists that come to Banff Centre.”

- Howard Jang, Vice President of Arts and Leadership programming.

The 2020 suite of Visual Arts Residency Programs offers professional training and growth opportunities for artists across disciplines to inspire innovation and creativity.

Emerging Banff Artist in Residence: January 06 - February 07, 2020

Banff Artist in Residence (BAiR) Emerging is an immersive program of studio practise, creative exploration, critical feedback and mentorship for visual artists in the early stages of their careers. 
Faculty include Bridget Moser, Nadia Kurd, and Divya Mehra.

Winter Banff Artist in Residence: January 06 - February 07, 2020

The Winter BAiR program is designed for visual artists to focus on their own practice in a supportive learning environment. Participants are encouraged to explore new ideas, create, self-direct their research and time, and cultivate new directions in their work. 
Guest faculty is Kim Nguyen.

Late Winter Banff Artist in Residence: February 24 - March 27, 2020

The Late Winter BAiR program is designed for visual artists to focus on their practice; experiment, create, and cultivate new directions in their work within a supportive community of peers and Banff Centre’s spectacular mountain setting. 
Guest artists and curators include Reena Kallat and Michael Schonhoff.

Object as Catalyst: June 1 - July 3, 2020

The Object as Catalyst program explores how object-based practices might shift from what they physically represent to the effects and experiences they produce. Artists will engage in creation and discourses around the performative process, social sculpture, object-hood, labour, material culture, relational and community practice. 
Faculty include Clare Twomey and Raphaëlle de Groot.

Late Spring Banff Artist in Residence Program: June 1 - July 3, 2020

The Late Spring BAiR program encourages visual artists to explore independent research, experiment and take risks. 
Additionally, artists attend talks and receive studio visits from program guest curator and artist, Dr Léuli Eshrāghi.

Summer:  BAIR, Self-Directed, July 20 – August 21, 2020

The Summer Banff Artist in Residence program is designed for artists exploring independent research themes, experimenting with production techniques, and cultivating new directions in their work.  Guest faculty and curators hold experience in multiple ways of working to support artists from a diverse spectrum of practice and backgrounds.

Summer: Thematic Program, Plastic, July 20 – August 21, 2020

Plastic is everywhere, and is increasingly an object of environmental concern. However, it also provides the basis of our contemporary infrastructures including buildings, clothing, and communications networks. In other words, despite the necessary campaigns for the elimination of single-use plastics, it is a material that cannot be easily dismissed. Indeed, it is one of the most intimate manifestations of our connections with oil, as it is used in everything from baby bottles to sex toys. It is also one of the foremost materials used in the production of contemporary art, from moulds to vinyl to paints.  How might we then reconfigure our relations to plastic, seeing it as a material of potential connection, of resilience, of queer productivity without denying its immediate and devastating environmental consequences? What might happen if we thought of it as incredibly valuable material, rather than as immanently expendable? This residency will invite makers and thinkers to reimagine their relations with this now fundamental material, to explore processes of recycling and reconstituting, to pay attention to the uneven materialities of plastic and its affordances as an artistic material.  
Faculty will include Heather Davis, Amanda Boetzkes, and Kelly Jazvac.

Fall: BAIR, Self-Directed September 14 – October 16, 2020

The Fall Banff Artist in Residence program is designed for artists exploring independent research themes, experimenting with production techniques, and cultivating new directions in their work.  Guest faculty and curators hold experience in multiple ways of working to support artists from a diverse spectrum of practice and backgrounds.

Fall: BICI Fellowship, Self-Directed, September 14 – December 4, 2020

The Banff International Curatorial Institute Fellowship Program supports established curators, arts writers, cultural critics, researchers, and artists in focusing deeply on the continued development of their work. The program allows for self-directed research over an extended period of 12 weeks, within the creative and intellectually stimulating environment of Visual Arts. Up to four participants are selected by an international jury for this unique full scholarship program. In addition to focusing on their own practice, participants are asked to engage with other artists-in-residence in Visual Arts programs; meet with them to grow their networks and expand their research, visit studios, join reading groups, share knowledge through presenting research in progress, engage with each other and curatorial and artistic staff at Banff Centre.  This program is adjudicated by a rotating international jury of artists, curators, art critics and academics.

About Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity: Founded in 1933, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity is Canada’s largest postgraduate arts and leadership school. What started as a single course in drama has grown to become the global organization leading in arts, culture, and creativity across dozens of disciplines. From our home on Treaty 7 territory in the stunning Canadian Rocky Mountains, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity aims to inspire everyone who attends our campus – artists, leaders, and thinkers – to unleash their creative potential and realize their unique contribution to society through cross-disciplinary learning opportunities, world-class performances, and public outreach. banffcentre.ca

Programs at Banff Centre are made possible in part by the Government of Alberta through Alberta Advanced Education and the Alberta Foundation for the Arts, and the Government of Canada through the Department of Canadian Heritage and Canada Council for the Arts.