Public call to all who muse, post and write about art production
"You’d mostly do it at home, but in summer you can also do it outside"[1]
In this public writing contest, the Sitterwerk Foundation is looking for texts that talk about art and its production in an innovative, experimental and personal manner. They may, for example, portray an artist, concentrate on an individual work of art or on craftspeople, zoom in on a particular material or process, or explain a digital or analog technique. The focus of this contest is on new forms of describing art that give center stage to materiality and production processes.
A jury will choose two winning texts, and a selection of all texts submitted will be published in the Sitterwerk’s Online Journal.
In the last few years, the art world, art critics and art history have become increasingly interested in art production – in its materials, economy and ecology. The places of art production are made a subject of discussion – not only studios and workshops but also professional art production companies, industrial suppliers, forwarders and storage companies. How is context incorporated in the description of art? How does one write about production conditions, processes, materiality, crafts, the profession, and about the act of artistic creation?
This writing contest is open for texts that try a new style, method and form, exploring personal, free formats.
Send us your text by Friday, 18 August 2023, at noon!
All writers will be invited to a joint dinner at Sitterwerk on Friday, 25 August. On this evening, the jury will announce the winners and award the prizes of 500.- francs each.
The members of the jury are:
Rémi Brandon, Founder of Soccochico and Lecturer at HEAD, Geneva
Rémi Brandon is a bookseller, editor and teacher based in Geneva. He is specialised on out-of-print publications and editions in the fields of modern and contemporary art, musical and literary movements, protest groups and underground publishing. The course he offers at HEAD—Geneva focus on the artist’ book as an artistic medium.
Deborah Keller, Chief Editor of Kunstbulletin, Zurich
Deborah Keller has been editor-in-chief of Kunstbulletin since the end of 2022. Prior to that, she most recently worked as an editor, freelance art critic, and curator at Kunsthalle Arbon. She is a board member of the art critics association AICA Switzerland and a member of the Art Commission of the Canton of Zurich.
Julia Künzi, Art Historian and Curator, Bern and Zurich
Julia Künzi is an art historian and works as assistant curator and publication manager at Kunsthalle Bern and as curator at Stiftung Binz39. She collaborated with Nora Halpern on managing the Poggibonsi offspace in Zurich and with Leo von Elm and Annina Herzer on Little in Bern. She participates in various projects, e.g. Brand-New-Life, Cinema Serpente and Lampenshowp Fantastique. Julia Künzi lives in Zurich.
Barbara Preisig, Art Historian, Lecturer and Art Critic, Zurich
Barbara Preisig is an art historian and art critic whose research concentrates on contemporary artistic practices and their social and political contexts. She investigates translocal, transdisciplinary and non-academic ways of writing and thinking and focuses, among other topics, on artistic research, feminism and the politics of authorship.
Barbara Preisig works as a researcher and lecturer at the Zurich University of the Arts and is co-editor of the Brand-New-Life magazine.
Laurin Schaub, Ceramicist and Artist, Bern
Born in Switzerland in 1984, Laurin Schaub started his career with an apprenticeship as potter in Willisau. After graduating from the Schule für Gestaltung in Bern with a diploma in ceramics design in 2008, he expanded his experience by working in traditional manufactories and developing his own design language. In 2014, he completed his post-graduate studies in contemporary ceramics at CERCCO, the ceramics department of HEAD Design School in Geneva. Laurin Schaub’s work has been honored many times. For example, he received a Swiss Design Award in 2018 and the Newcomer Prize for Design of the Berner Design Stiftung in 2021. After teaching at the Schule für Gestaltung in Bern for several years, Laurin has concentrated on his own work in his own studio and with his label, PUUL, since summer 2022. He pursues topical questions on design between the poles of traditional crafts and new technologies. His work is represented by NOV Gallery in Geneva, Nendo Gallery in Marseille and OKRO in Chur. Laurin Schaub lives and works in Bern.
Kathrin Siegrist, Artist, Basel
Kathrin Siegrist is an artist living in Basel. Her work oscillates between painting and textile art and explores the intra-activity of materials, bodies and situations. She heads the painting workshop of the Institute Art Gender Nature at HGK Basel, FHNW.
Bettina Zimmermann, Art Historian and Assistant at Kesselhaus Josephsohn, Zurich and St.Gallen
[1] Linus Bill, Meistens macht man die im Haus, aber im Sommer gehts auch draussen, Nieves, Zurich, 2007
On the 25th of August, the jury selected the two texts 8.8.23 Written Matter – What turns me into a membrane by Sara Grütter and The Arachnid Research Laboratory Weaving-Unfolding-Transforming by Beatrice Zaidenberg.