The Idea Fund Announces Round Twelve 2020 Grantees
By: A.A. Cristi Dec. 19, 2019
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The Idea Fund, a re-granting program administered by DiverseWorks, Aurora Picture Show, and Project Row Houses and funded by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, is thrilled to announce Round 12 (2020) grant recipients: Latifa AlBokhari, Britni Andrews, Black TM, Anne Buckwalter, Civic TV, Mitchell Collins, Familia Artist Collective, Junior Fernandez & S Rodriguez, Brandon Harris, Sin Huellas, Cecilia Norman, Stephanie Saint Sanchez, Michael Stevenson, and TAME, The Aspiring Me - Andrew Davis.
Round 12 was juried by Brian Ellison, artist and 2019 Idea Fund recipient, Amanda Hunt, Director of Education & Senior Curator of Programs, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, and Bob Snead, Executive Director, Antenna, New Orleans. It was a pleasure to get to understand the Houston creative community better through The Idea Fund granting process. Houston has it all - artists, world-class non-profits and institutions, a diversity of communities - so it was an honor to support projects connecting all of those pieces. - Amanda HuntIdea Fund Round 12 Grantees and Projects:
Stimulus ($7,000):
BLACK TM - SLANT RHYME & RAVEN CRANE
Black and Brown Mail Art Biennale
Black TM is a performance-based collaboration of Slant Rhyme and Raven Crane that consists of essays, conversations, and archival investigations that seek to explore the paradoxes, limitations, and social ramifications of trans representation within contemporary culture and the contradictions of capitalism and its deleterious effects on black and brown bodies. The Idea Fund will support their newest project, the Black and Brown Mail Art Biennale, an exhibition that offers a survey of original artworks from QTBIPOC contemporary artists from the southern gulf region.
Seabrook, TX
Seabrook, TX is a documentary film about a coastal Texas town reckoning with the impending challenges of climate change. In the film, Collins gives members of the community an opportunity to speak about their history with Seabrook and about the possibility that it may not be habitable 20 years from now. With support from The Idea Fund, Collins will produce and premiere Seabrook, TX in a series of showcases with a culminating event next fall that will feature readings by local poets and environmentalists.
Notas Jotas
Notas Jotas is a collection of art and writing by LGBTQ+ Latinx voices presented in a bilingual format. Collaboratively edited and printed by the Familia Artist Collective, Notas Jotas in Houston will be a cornerstone of a series of regional gatherings of Latinx LGBTQ+ folks planned across the United States in 2020. The project serves both as a tool for cultural organizing and a document that aims to uplift and honor those historically marginalized within the Latinx identity: LGBTQ+ folks, specifically emphasizing the voices of trans women, black Latinxs, indigenous/afroindigenous people, mono-lingual Spanish speakers, gender non-binary and gender non-conforming folks, women, and immigrant and undocumented folks.
Detention Nation 2020
In the fall of 2020, Sin Huellas will reassemble Detention Nation, a site-specific installation conceived as a platform to bring awareness to the need for change to US immigration policies. With funding from The Idea Fund, Sin Huellas seeks to design their installation to include new work that brings awareness to US detention centers and immigration policies and how they are affecting immigrant communities in Houston.
Seedless
Seedless is a site-specific installation and performance in the neighborhood of Lake Olympia, formerly known as the Palmer Plantation, in Southwest Houston. The project seeks to shine a light on Lake Olympia's significant history and to inspire a new generation of community members to connect and examine local history and place. Seedless will serve as the first site-specific installation of its kind in the Lake Olympia community.
CIVIC TV
9
Civic TV is an artist-run concept that develops nomadic exhibitions and programming in collaboration with Houston area artists and arts organizations. With support from The Idea Fund, Civic TV will develop the collaboratively curated exhibition, 9, for the 2020 FotoFest Biennial. 9 will explore the vast landscape of Houston's diverse African Diaspora through the work of nine local artists from a wide range of disciplines, demographic backgrounds, and career levels.
without architecture there would be no stonewall, without architecture there would be no "brick"
Junior Fernandez and S Rodriguez will come together to create a site-specific inflatable installation and performance, without architecture there would be no stonewall, without architecture there would be no "brick," to emphasize alternate modes of architecture that favor the ephemeral. Inspired by similar architectural interventions revolving around the construction and deconstruction of space in the 1970s, Fernandez and Rodriguez will use their support from The Idea Fund to construct an inflatable likeness of the legendary (and now closed) Houston gay bar, Mary's, placing it alongside the original building to act as a ghostly reflection of a once vibrant center of queer nightlife and a celebration of the revolutionary energies that fueled the American gay and lesbian civil rights movement.
Ma?? Via??t Nam ơi, Chúng Con Va??n Còn ?'ây (Oh Mother Vietnam, We Are Still Here)
The project Ma?? Via??t Nam ơi, Chúng Con Va??n Còn ?'ây will examine the history of the Vietnamese diaspora in relation to the Houston and Gulf Coast region where many refugees settled after the Vietnam War. The project will emphasize the resilience of this marginalized community through the artist's journeys as he visits sites in Seabrook, Texas, old and new Chinatowns, Village apartments, and his family's homes throughout Houston. With support from The Idea Fund, Harris's research will culminate in a mixed-media sculptural installation.
Survival Movements
Survival Movements is a series of gatherings and discussions that unpack issues related to sexual trauma. With the support of The Idea Fund, Norman will create a space that offers participants an opportunity to explore how art can be used as a tool for healing and conversation through hand-made animations. The project will feature a series of open dialogues that explore survival in a way that uncovers common experiences and expresses them in potentially anonymous and creative manners.
A Lot A Land
A Lot A Land is rooted in the radical imagination of considering a reality wherein reparations were distributed amongst people of color and indigenous persons here in America. It posits how we might utilize those resources to inspire a new generation of freedom of expression, community engagement, and art as activism for the betterment of our environment. Nestled in 5th Ward, A Lot A Land will present monthly events and programs that engage the artists living in or near the Fifth Ward with artists in the Greater Houston area in order to gather and celebrate arts and culture.
Spark ($1,000):
LATIFA ALBOKHARI
Naas (People)
Naas is a photography exhibition that shines a light on communities Albokhari identified with while growing up as an immigrant and as a Muslim Arab woman in Texas. Naas in Arabic means "people" and this project is dedicated to the brown people who are less represented and have many untold stories, especially in one of the most diverse cities in the US. The visuals in the exhibition will capture the cultural clash of the Middle East and Texas, reflecting the beauty of diversity and how it feels to become yourself as an immigrant.
The Session: LGBTQ+ Mental Health feat. Queer People of Color
The Session: LGBTQ+ Mental Health feat. Queer People of Color is a short film composed of private unscripted dialogues. The Session holds space for QPOC to discuss the process of navigating the impacts of their cultural identity in the expression of their gender, sexuality, and the development of affirming and inclusive relationships. With support from The Idea Fund, Andrews seeks to extend conversations from the film into a live panel discussion and community dialogue.
ANNE BUCKWALTER
Comforter
Comforter is a book of images and short stories that explore gray areas surrounding female health, sexuality, and intimacy. Functioning as both an artist book and a collection of short stories, the volume organizes images of paintings and works of short fiction created by artist and writer Anne Buckwalter. Through sinister portraits of orderly domestic life alongside stories of female protagonists controlling and not controlling their bodies, Comforter delves into the gender pain gap- the reality that women are less likely to be treated for pain than men and are less likely to be believed in the doctor's office. The book combs through themes of infertility, anxiety, sexual dysfunction, consent, menstruation, menopause, and mortality while enabling lightness and humor to live alongside accounts of physical and emotional pain.
LOCA LOVE!
LOCA LOVE! is a theatrical, cinematic hybrid combining a trio of very different short performances with a wrap-around story taking on the myth of the LATINA PASSION with a sci-fi/fantasy twist. With a goal to entertain while starting a conversation about erasure culture vs mindful co-existence and the parameters of freedom of expression, LOCA LOVE! seeks to unpack LOVE in extreme circumstances and how it survives for better or worse.
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