Our mission:
Artists operate in a unique ecosystem where work and friendships are intensely intertwined: our coworkers, our competitors, and our audience are also our friends. Through Peer Review, we are trying to materialize these relationships. Instead of framing our own work within institutional art criticism, we want to play with new forms of analysis, coming from our own studio vernacular. We ask you to describe another artist’s work and how it makes you feel.
As curators (and artists), we want to make sure this is not an arbitrary process that results in bad pairings of reviewer and artist. We are interested in mixing and matching people. We will look into style, medium and intent. This is not a reciprocal exercise. A reviewer will be paired with an artist whose work we feel will be best served by the reviewer’s sensibilities. Artist statements and images from each applicant will determine the best fits for this exercise. Applicants who have demonstrated a solid background and history in art-making are preferred. We will not take into account any publication history.
Expectations from participants:
This is an exercise of love and attention by artists for artists. Artists will be expected to dedicate time and attention to writing about the work. In turn, their work will be reviewed by another artist. We ask that you do for another as you might hope they do for you – give you attention and thoughts. Although not required, we encourage you to do studio visits in person, or via zoom in preparation for your writing assignment. We will assign you an artist and their contact information after you’ve been approved to be part of the Peer Review cohort. Each review should be between 600-1000 words. The review is intended to be a thoughtful text-based investigation of the work that centers the artist being reviewed and not the reviewer (e.g., NOT a drawing, sculpture, poem or performance inspired by the work being reviewed). We are not against creativity, we just want the artist being reviewed to feel seen in a written format.
Editors who support the mission of reviews of artists by artists will be announced shortly. Volunteer editors will work with the artists to assist in the process. A full color high res-image of each artist’s work will be included in the publication.
The paperbound book for Vol. 2 will be slated for publication in early December, 2023. Participating artists will be given an individual copy. The book will be available for purchase by friends and family to cover the editorial, design and publication costs, if possible.