Williamsburg Art & Historical Center - Open Call Art Exhibit "Metal & Plastic:"

Dear Artists and Friends,

We are going to have a long awaited “Metal and Plastic" show starting on Oct. 21.

Because the month of October is our anniversary month, we’ve decided to have this show to celebrate our 27th Anniversary in October - November.

In conjunction with the fine art show, we are also planning on having a “Metal and Plastic” Fashion show if possible.

Realizing the crucial reality of Climate Change we need to think seriously about how to preserve the Mother Nature.

Most visual artists create their works by using natural products of Mother Nature. I became interested in finding out how artists utilize these products with the idea in mind about how to preserve Mother Nature.

To initiate the idea revolving around the subject, the WAH Center started the fresh fall season last year with the first show “Clay & Textile” (Sept. 10 - Oct. 22, 2022).

The next show was “Wood and Paper” (Nov. 12, 2022 - Jan. 14, 2023). Our life is inseparable from wood and paper, and because we are surrounded with plenty of these common materials, we tend to use them mindlessly and carelessly in our daily life, and by over-exploitation of this resource such that we have helped cause Climate Change. We have taken for granted that these resources would be always available. But the reality was quite opposite. We have started seeing the drastic decreasing number of these resources.

While wood and paper are essentially the same substance, what we witnessed in the “wood and paper" show was a quite remarkable delightful and surprising, which we had never thought of before. Artists’ creativity never ceases to push limits!!!

The “Metal and Plastic” show is our 3rd consecutive thematic show of the materials that humans have molded to their needs and benefit.

While metal has been part of nature in various forms prehistorically, plastic is a very new material.

So, it would be very interesting to find our how artists create their works using either prehistorically existing metal or newly created (in 1920) plastic. When I see the bottomless artists’ creativity, I have great anticipation in seeing something inspiring beyond the horizon.

We expect this show to be another exciting one!

Followings are the brief explanations of METAL and PLASTICS.

METAL is a material that, when freshly prepared, polished, or fractured, shows a lustrous appearance, and conducts electricity and heat relatively well. The first finding of metal was gold found in Spanish caves dating to the late Paleolithic period, 40,000BC. There are three types of metal: 1) Ferrous (contains iron), 2) Nonferrous (contains no iron) 3), Alloys (contains multiple, including bronze and and steel), and following are the 10 metal examples: aluminium, copper, iron, tin, gold, lead, silver, titanium, uranium, and zinc.

PLASTICS: It was only a little over a century ago, plastic was born out of a test tube in a chemist’s garage, and cellulose was created from organic compounds. And Leo Bakeland created the world's first entirely synthetic plastic called Bakelite. This marks the start of the modern plastics industry. Plastics are a wide range of synthetic or semi-synthetic materials that use polymers as a main ingredient. Their plasticity makes it possible for plastics to be moulded, extruded or pressed into solid objects of various shapes. This adaptability, plus a wide range of other properties, such as being lightweight, durable, flexible, and inexpensive to produce, has led to its widespread use. Plastics typically are made through human industrial systems. Most modern plastics are derived from fossil fuel-based chemicals like natural gas or petroleum; however, recent industrial methods use variants made from renewable materials, such as corn or cotton derivatives. In just a few generations, this material has grown to define our world. Plastics have transformed our bodies, our culture, and excessive proliferation and poor disposal has caused environmental damage. How to maintain a clean environment has become one of our serious concern.

Here is the necessary information regarding the show.

Submission Fee: You may submit 4 pieces maximum. The submission fee fo the first 2 entries is $45, and an additional fee of $10 for each piece.

We can accept Paypal payment: Please send to wahcenter@earthlink.net.

Please send us the submission materials, including entry form, images of the work (high resolution, printable, and large size) and resume/statement to the special Gmail account we created for the show to: metalandplasticatwah@gmail.com.

1) Entry Form:

2) Images of work: high resolution, printable and large size, send to: metalandplasticatwah@gmail.com.

Image specification: Largest dimension of an image should be minimum 1500 pixels (more is OK)

Smallest dimension of an image should be minimum 1200 pixels (more is OK)

That equals 10" x 8" at 150ppi.

Formats can be JPEG, which we prefer, but TIFF or PNG acceptable at best quality.

3) Resume/Statement combined together within 600 words.

The document must be in editable word.doc format for a possible show catalogue production. A catalogue designer needs to adjust the wording to fit on one page.

We might produce a catalogue of the show. For that purpose, we ask you to follow the Special Instructions below very carefully.

Instructions for Catalogue, on One page Resume and Statement combined together with less than 600 words.

Please see the following samples with the Resume/Statement with less than 600 words.

Rresume must be in Chronological order: list the oldest on top and the most recent items at the bottom.

Please look at these samples and create your own resume in the same consistent oder.

A.1) Sample of Resume & Statement.docx

A.2) Sample of Resume & Statement copy.docx

A.3) Sample of Resume & Statement.docx

Looking forward to receiving your submission to the show!

With Warm Regards,

Yuko

.

Yuko Nii

Founder & Artistic Director of the WAH Center

135 Broadway, Brooklyn, NY 11211

917-648-4290