Call for Submissions for The Mush Hole Project

An Invitation to Aboriginal Artists for Truth and Reconciliation Response Projects – open now until June 19, 2016.

We are pleased to be working in partnership for this important project that will be taking place at the Mohawk Institute Residential School. This call for submissions is open to Aboriginal artists. Please submit your proposals by June 19. http://www.akimbo.ca/95248. Please share and submit your work!

Mush Hole Project:

Important Dates
Call for Submissions: May 1 – June 19, 2016
Notification Date: June 30, 2016
Event Dates: September 16 – 18, 2016

Mush Hole Project
Contact: Andy Houston
Email: houston[at]uwaterloo.ca
Phone: 519-888-4567 ext. 37029

http://mushholeproject.ca/themes

Submissions must include the following:

  • Project Description: applicants should describe the proposed art work, project, or performance including title, medium, dimensions, duration, spatial and technological requirements
  • Selection of Images: 2-3 images of the art work, project, or performance (if it is an existing piece)
  • Artist’s CV: current, maximum 3 pages
  • Applications are to be submitted in a single PDF document — with the subject line “Mush Hole Project” — in care of Greg Campbell: greg.campbell@uwaterloo.ca

The Mush Hole Project is an immersive, site-specific art and performance installation event taking place at the Woodland Cultural Centre (Brantford) from September 16 to 18, 2016. This project aims to respond to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s Calls to Action and to preserve, query, and reveal the complex personal, political, and public narratives around Canada’s residential school system, in general, and the Mohawk Institute Indian Residential School (at the Woodland Cultural Centre) specifically, through the art of contemporary Aboriginal artists.

The Mush Hole Project selection committee is seeking individual responses from artists that question the following: Apartheid, Assimilation, Decolonization, Education, Genocide, Intergenerational Trauma, Mohawk Institute, Nourishment, Reconciliation, and Truth. The artists of the Mush Hole Project will animate the Mohawk Institute Indian Residential School site. Artists may propose interior and/or exterior works or creative interventions and should identify a site on the grounds of the Woodland Cultural Centre for the installation or performance of their work (for example, the driveway, apple orchard, library, kitchen, etc). Artists are encouraged to consider the residential school system through the dichotomy of both historical and contemporary knowledges and creative practices.

Mush Hole Project and Save the Evidence: The Mohawk Institute Indian Residential School building at the Woodland Cultural Centre has been providing in-depth and historically significant insight into the Residential School System for the past 44 years. The Mohawk Institute is one of less than 10 residential schools still standing across Canada. With close to 10,000 visitors every year, tours and programs offer a distinctive look into First Nations and Canadian history. The Mush Hole Project aims to raise awareness and encourage support for the Save the Evidence campaign, to ensure that the physical evidence of this dark chapter in Canadian history is never forgotten.

Selection Process
The selection committee encourages proposals by artists from Six Nations of the Grand in Ontario and from the greater Ontario region; however, all Aboriginal artists are encouraged to apply. Artists may propose new works or offer existing works for the consideration of the selection committee. The committee is interested in a wide range of media including, but not limited to: dance, film/media, installation, sound art, visual/theatrical/musical performance, and visual art.

Selected artists will each receive an honorarium of not less than $1,000. Artists are responsible for providing their own supplies, materials, and technical devices, as well as crating, shipping, and/or transportation of the art works to the Mush Hole Project site. Installations will be scheduled with the participating artists throughout the month of August.

Note for multimedia artists: Mush Hole Project partner, REAP (Research Entrepreneurs Accelerating Prosperity), is offering up to 3 weeks use of their digital facility, as well as equipment use for on-site installations.

Mush Hole Project Selection Committee:

Pat Deadman, Artist/Curator/Writer
Andrew Houston, University of Waterloo
Erika Iserhoff, Native Women in the Arts
Naomi Johnson, Artistic Director, Woodland Cultural Centre
Monique Mojica, Playwright/Director/Actor
Dawn Owen, Art Gallery of Guelph