Introduction and Mission
Genesis Project, Los Angeles is a collaborative artist’s residency catering to artists whose practice exists between disciplines and works with and through the body. The project is modeled after Genesis, Dublin, Ireland, which began in 2004 when dance artists Julie Lockett and Ella Clarke, in conversation with seminal post-modern choreographer Deborah Hay, asked the question ‘as an artist, what do I need?’ Our mission is to support artists in accessing space in which to work and fortify a practice and a community from which to act globally. Genesis facilitates an environment wherein creativity is the act of investigation rather than what is produced from it. By asking artists to commit to daily, autonomous practice without focus on a final product, Genesis aims to heighten productivity of the collective at work in the project and to sharpen the potency of each artist’s daily practice. As was evident in the Dublin incarnations of Genesis, this model yields a unique environment for investigation and the creation of innovative artistic, body-based work.
Directed by Los Angeles-based dance artist Hana van der Kolk with assistance from New York City-based multi-media artist Arturo Vidich, Genesis, Los Angeles offers participants space, time, an artistic collective, and a variety of other resources, though artists are responsible for their own housing. The project aims to serve a culturally and artistically diverse group of 5-6 Los Angeles-based artists, tapping a variety of artistic communities in order to attract the group. Genesis Project, LA also maintains a secondary mission to facilitate public events throughout the year such as panels, discussions, showings, and workshops related to inter-disciplinary, body-based arts practice and methods of artistic process.
The first Genesis, LA took place in August of 2008 at Sea and Space Explorations in Highland Park. The project supported four LA-based artists: Cheryl Banks Smith, Alison O’Daniel, Cesar Garcia, and Brooke Smiley, as well as Liz Atkin from London, UK. Stay tuned for information on Genesis, LA 2010. Genesis Project, Philadelphia, directed by Arturo Vidich will take place in August 2009 at Basekamp www.culturepush.org/?q=node/283.
Project Structure
Each of the Genesis artists signs a contract (with the fellow residents and project director), agreeing to work in the provided space for 2-3 hours a day, 5 or 6 days a week throughout the month-long project. 15-30 minute overlap times between individual sessions allow artists to sit in on the practice time of the preceding artist. This overlap window could include observation, dialogue, or collaboration as determined primarily by the artist already in the space.
During the project the Genesis artists will be the sole occupants of the studio in which they work. They will be able to store supplies in the space and make it comfortable for practice/work sessions, rest, and gathering. Each Saturday the group will clean and maintain the space. An announcement board will be displayed, which participants may use for logistical communications and for offering one another ideas for structuring daily investigation. A collective journal will also be kept for more extensive writing on the practice sessions.
Genesis is an intensive project. Residents must be available for a 3-hour work session between the hours of 7am and 10pm at least five days per week. Genesis artists must be available Wednesday evenings after 7pm and all day on Saturdays throughout the month.
Weekly Group Meetings and Workshops
On Saturdays the group will gather for 6-8-hours to clean and maintain the studio, converse about the work they are engaged in and evaluate and refine of the structure of the residency. On these days the group will be provided with a delicious, home-cooked meal. The weekly meetings will also include participant-led workshops and workshops led by people from the Los Angeles community. Workshop topics could include collective communication, various creative/movement practices, technical skills, or other topics deemed useful, exciting, and relevant by the group. Throughout the residency, and particularly during the Saturday meetings, collective decision making about space maintenance, revisions to the residency structure, schedules, feedback and other key components to the project, will be engaged as much as possible, though the project director will act as facilitator when necessary. Additional Wednesday evening meetings or workshops may be scheduled. Stay tuned for guest artists workshop schedule for Genesis 2009.
Peer Studio Visits
At the start of the project the participant will meet the Genesis artists advisory board and learn about each board member’s art practice. Throughout the month residents are invited to ask artists from this group (or other LA-based artists) to come into practice sessions for dialogue, feedback, and potential collaboration.
Documentation
The participants are asked to document some or all of their sessions through written, photographed, filmed and/or inter-media form. This will provide the artists with a way of reflecting on and developing their practice after the project as well as serving as an archive for the development of future incarnations of Genesis.
Open House /Closing Event
The group is asked to host a closing event at the end of the month. Participants will determine the nature of this event, which might include a showing, a discussion, a party, a screening, or some other public engagement. The event will be designed and run by the residents, though the project director will collaborate with the group as needed.
Post-residency Contact
During the year following the residency (and beyond) Genesis Project artists are able to stay connected via the project’s Facebook group page. Participants are able to upload photos, video, and text to the site and may receive feedback on their work from the other participants with whom they have hopefully developed a trusted artistic relationship. The LA-based artists meet during the year following their residency to discuss how the residency affected their artistic work in an effort to further develop future incarnations of the project, and to re-connect with the other Genesis participants and share current projects.
Additional Resources
Throughout the month coffee, tea, water and snacks will be available in the space. Genesis Project will supply a projector, some minimal lighting, extension cords, fans (if necessary), and various art supplies/fabric/junk. Resident artists are responsible for any other specialized materials they may need.
Residency Goals
We hope…
1. That this unique population of artists will leave the residency having developed new skills and ways of thinking that will support them as they continue on their paths as cutting-edge multidisciplinary artists
2. To cultivate continuing cross-cultural and international dialogues that allow participants to leave the residency with a greater awareness about the broad artistic contexts they are working in
3. That artists will feel they have begun or deepened a rigorous investigation of their transitioning and/or multidisciplinary artistic practice and that they have discovered new directions that they are interested in continuing to investigate
4. Artists will create connections, engage in dialogues, and/or embark on collaborations with one another that may grow beyond the scope of the residency
Our success with these goals is measured through regular and ongoing contact with the project’s participants in the year following their residency. We track participants’ creative projects and the types of collaborative configurations in which they are working. We dialogue with them at regular intervals about what kind of impact they feel Genesis Project had on their trajectories as artists.