São Paulo – The 21st SESC Videobrasil Contemporary Art Biennial is now open to registrations from Brazilian and foreign artists interested in exhibiting their works. The exhibition, one of the country’s major contemporary art shows, is scheduled for October 9, 2019 to February 2, 2020 in São Paulo. It usually includes Arab artists (in the picture above, the installation ‘Here and There’, by Lebanese visual artist Roy Dib, in the 2017 edition).
Registrations opened on July 6 and end on August 10, 2018. The exhibition will give out many prizes, the major one being BRL 100,000 (USD 27,910). Three artists will be chosen for a residency in Brazil.
The theme of the 21st edition is “Imagined Communities,” a reference to the title of the book written by North American author Benedict Anderson on nationalism. The organization has chosen this theme because it perceives it as shaping global disputes. It aims to show how the poetic language coming from developing countries formulates the phenomenon.
Eligible categories include public actions, performing arts, collage, drawing, sculpture, photography, film, print, painting, tapestry, video and other forms of artistic expression. The festival has three sections: exhibition and films programme, public programmes and publications.
The artists chosen will be advised by guest artists selected by the curatorship staff, who will propose a dialogue between the artists’ work and the proposed curatorial investigation. They will be able to exhibit in one or more platforms. Each artist can submit up to five works, which must be entered simultaneously and must never have been exhibited in São Paulo.
The selection committee will select up to 50 artists or groups. The shortlist will be announced until February 28. The participants or teams will receive BRL 2,750 (USD 770) for a copyright transfer agreement.
The 21st SESC Videobrasil Contemporary Art Biennial will offer seven prizes. Best artist or group will win BRL 100,000 (USD 27,910) for the State of the Art Award. Two participants will win BRL 50,000 (USD 13,960) for the Contemporary Art Sesc Award, and one artist will win BRL 25,000 (USD 6,980) for the Ostrovsky Family Fund Award (O.F.F), for best moving image investigation. Three young artists – who first exhibited less than ten years ago – will be chosen for the residency.
Registrations are open to artists from nearly all parts of the world: the Global South, which includes Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia (except Japan), Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Oceania and the Community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries (CPLP); and artists from the rest of the world, with the exception of Germany, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Spain, United States, Finland, France, the Netherlands, Iceland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Norway, United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland, San Marino, Sweden, Switzerland and the Vatican.
The biennial is organized by Videobrasil Cultural Association and the Social Service for Coomerce (SESC-SP). The works will be in exhibition at SESC 24 de Maio and Galpão VB, both in São Paulo. Further information at 21bienal@videobrasil.org.br. Check out the open call here.
Translated by Sérgio Kakitani
