Open call: Banyan Commune Artist Residency Project 2018-2019

About Banyan Commune
The city border in flux, where seats Guangdong Times Museum, sees the shaping of the archetypal suburban landscape of the Pearl River Delta enabled by hybrid forms of urbanization and complex demographics. Diverse communities coalesce in this land of variegated attributes: native rural populations, the new middle-class drawn by real estate development, and migrant workers gathering around small manufacturing concerns, all growing in symbiosis—such is the surrounding and context of the museum. In the new round of urban planning, the Huangbian community that houses the museum is under renovation to be the Design Capital of Guangzhou, one of the largest industrial clusters of design in Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. Undergoing a process of swift gentrification, how would the museum and art witness, engage in and respond to such a zealous social transformation?

Banyan Commune is a unique phenomenon of community life and civil culture in southern China, a gathering place traditionally served as a community center for the neighborhood. The Banyan Commune is a community art project initiated in 2016, which space has witnessed the seasonal changes, day-and-night alternate of the surrounding neighborhood while serving as the window for connecting the museum to public.

The artist will act as a host of this temporary public space, using the Huangbian neighbourhood as research subject to foster continuous dialogue, understanding, and communication about the actual context of the museum. Reflecting on the role of the contemporary art museum in a residential community while constructing organic relations between the institution and the surrounding place, Banyan Commune intends to generate a trace for the ever-changing region of South China in the process of urbanization. The selected projects for 2017-2018 were What It Meant to Me Will Eventually Be a Memory by Bangkok based artist Henry Tan, and We Are Singing the Song of Our Time by Ye Hui (open to public on June 2nd).

The Banyan Commune welcomes proposals by local and international artists and collectives for bi-annual, month-long residencies. Proposed projects should be visual, participatory, and public engaging in nature, including installation, video, sounds, performance, and events among others. Selected artist or artist collective will be provided with:

–Accommodation and workspace with basic living facilities
–Round-trip economy-class flight or train tickets to Guangzhou
–Living expenses during the residency
–Production budget of up to 50,000 RMB (appox. 7,500 USD)
–Assistance with applying for extra grants or sponsorships
–Project assistant, support for academic research and translation, etc.

Application requirements

–Project proposal, including the statement, working schedule, presentation plan, and a detailed plan of project realization
–Applicant’s portfolio
–Description of assistance needed for realizing the project

To apply
Please combine all your application files into a single PDF file and e-mail to banyan [​at​] timesmuseum.org (For video please include it as a web link.)

Application deadline: June 30, 2018

Reviewing process
The proposed projects will undergo two rounds of reviewing committee evaluation. Committee is composed of the curatorial and public programmes departments of Times Museum. The first round will be within one month after the deadline for application. Five proposals will be selected for the second round of review. Selected artists will then need to provide further plan within 15 days. Two proposals will be selected for the residency each year. The finalists will be published on the museum’s website and other media. All applicants will receive email notification regardless of whether they are selected.

Please note
Before submitting your application, it’s suggested that the artist do local research on the city of Guangzhou and the context of the surrounding community of Times Museum.

The Banyan Commune project focuses on locality, and we encourage the participating artists to collaborate with various local institutions, researchers and other artists into the proposal.