CALL FOR NEW DISCOURSE AROUND THE WORK OF FELIX GONZALEZ-TORRES

Rockbund Art Museum and the Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation announce an open call for writers and authors based in Asia.

Initiated after the first institutional exhibition of Felix Gonzalez-Torres’s work in China, curated by Larys Frogier and Li Qi at the Rockbund Art Museum, the open call builds upon a dialogue between Rockbund Art Museum and the Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation. In alignment with the artist’s evocative use of everyday materials and practice of encouraging mutable readings of each work, the open call invites thinkers and practitioners in any stage of their career to contemplate the artist’s body of work anew and to develop connections that situate the work in the context of issues pertinent to contemporary China and wider Asia.

The call is open to writers from a broad range of contexts, including but not limited to economics, cultural anthropology, political activism, legal studies, technology studies, art history, physics, literature, and environmental studies. Another important motivation for this call is to highlight the ways Gonzalez-Torres’s practice intersects with other disciplines and remains relevant amid ever-changing social, cultural, and technological contexts.

In conjunction with the open call organized by Rockbund, a parallel call for writers has also been organized by the Foundation, constituting a wider invitation to expand the dialogue around Gonzalez-Torres into new fields of inquiry and discussion. Together, the texts resulting from both open calls will serve as an essential component of the forthcoming catalogue, which aim to explore the evolution and breadth of the artist’s continued significance and influence. The authors of ten to fifteen selected proposals—spanning both calls—will receive an honorarium of 1,500 USD to expand their proposal into essays of approximately 1,500 to 2,000 words. 

View of “Felix Gonzalez-Torres”2016, Rockbund Art Museum, Shanghai. Courtesy of Rockbund Art Museum, Shanghai.

An additional 500 USD will be given to the authors of select essays that will be included in the catalogue scheduled for publication at the end of 2019. The curatorial premise of the exhibition at Rockbund Art Museum was to highlight both the connections and ruptures between the unique qualities of the artist’s oeuvre and the transformative changes facing Chinese society, and the catalogue is envisaged as a continuation of this curatorial approach.

Please submit proposals of 200–300 words to billy.tang@rockbundartmuseum.org. Not every submitter will be invited to expand their proposal, but every proposal will be read carefully and will receive a response. Though this call will not be considering fiction or poetry, it is open to any form of nonfiction prose writing. 

The Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation aims to broaden its network of writers and thinkers engaged with Gonzalez-Torres’s work and may approach submitters about future publishing opportunities. While the deadlines above are tied to the circumstances of this publication, please note that the Foundation is always open to receiving proposals on an ongoing basis and is committed to providing support for new writing that considers or responds to Gonzalez-Torres’s work. For more information, please visit www.felixgonzalez-torresfoundation.org or click “read more”.

Rockbund Art Museum would like to kindly thank the Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation for the generous support and on-going partnership in the realization of this open call.