Call for submissions | FESTIVAL DER REGIONEN 2013 / UMGRABEN
Festival of Regions 2013: Digging Up in Eferding, 7 to 16 June 2013
The Festival of Regionshas been exploring and conquering a region or a town in Upper Austria every two years since 1993. Far from the metropolises and cultural centres, a program with contemporary art and culture is designed and communicated to all the residents of a chosen region. Apart from regional, national and international participation by creative artistic and cultural agents, collaboration with local associations, institutions and individuals is sought to anchor the festival in the area and so leave behind traces that are as deep and distinct as can be.
Apart from reinforcing and furthering regional initiatives in the cultural sector, raising awareness of cultural developments is one of the festival’s aims. With the aspects of communication, open dialogue and interconnecting everyday culture and art, the most important tasks of the Festival of Regions are already formulated. Above all, however, a great festival of arts is supposed to be celebrated for which the ingredients: humour, substantive focus and artistic quality, as well as cultural co-existence, provide the spice.
The festival venue of Eferding is known principally as a commercial vegetable growing area, especially as a supplier of mini-gherkins that areharvested by the legendary ‘gherkin flyers’. It is less well-known that Eferding, founded in 1222, is the third oldest town in Austria and can look back on an eventful history that stretches from the Nibelung saga via the peasant uprisings up to the dominant royal house of the Starhembergers. This time we will be engaging with a conservative, good middle-class town. Music has a lively and manifold presence, whereas other forms of contemporary art are not so noticeable.The town has a population of 3,768; the district has 31,700. – As always at the Festival of Regions, the public domain will serve as both a space for artistic action and a hospitable meeting place. There is a variety of interior spaces in the town available for performances and installations. From the centre the festival program can expand into the nearby environs.For information about the festival venue, visit www.eferding.at
Digging Up is the motto for the Eferding Festival of Regions. On the one hand, this suits the agricultural character of the place, and on the other, digging up can also bring to the light of day things that have been hidden and covered up. In any case, things first have to be dug up if something new is to grow, if new fruits are to be harvested. The motto is therefore a metaphor for planting today’s art and culture, whereby rare plants and blossoms are hoped for in all possible mutations and variations.
Call for submissions Project proposals are invited from all artistic areas and genres. In an atmosphere of openness, projects with local specificity will be given preference nonetheless, along with endeavours that engage with the town’s social history and draw in as many strata of the population and individual positive forces as possible, for which role we will gladly function as mediator. Connotations with the festival motto of Digging Up will also be considered. However, please do not submit ready-made projects without any connection to the festival’s location or theme.
Components of project proposals • Short summary of the project (maximum of 500 characters), • Project description with a maximum of expressive visualization in the form of sketches, photos, plans, ideas about medication, etc. • Spatial and situational requirements. • Presentation of the project’s author and/or the main actors. • Organizational requirements. • Schedule for development and realization. • Financial plan. • Address, telephone numbers, e-mail address, website. • Submissions in German or English with a maximum of seven pages. Deadline for submissions is 16 May 2012 (postmark) by normal mail or by e-mail as a Word or PDF file to the Festival of Regions, Marktplatz 12, 4100 Ottensheim / Austria; einreichung@fdr.at, Telephone +43 (0)7234 – 85285, www.fdr.at
Selection method The board and director of the Festival of Regions will make a first selection with the support of an independent, nationwide program advisory board. The artistic director will compile a festival program on the basis of the selected projects. All programmatic decisions are final and made without the possibility of recourse to a court of law.
Preview of the locality For 23 March 2012 the Festival of Regions is extending an invitation to come to Eferding to take a look at the festival venue together with the organizers and local representatives. Meeting-place: Main Town Square at 2 p.m. On 29 March 2012 from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m., a discussion will take place with Gottfried Hattinger in the Linz Keplersalon. Address: Rathausgasse 5, 4020 Linz. www.kepler-salon.at
At the end of March a short video tour of Eferding will be released.
Organization The Festival of Regions is an independent association supported by the State of Upper Austria, the Federal Ministry for Education, Art and Culture, and the City of Linz. The 2013 edition will be supported in addition by the Municipality of Eferding. The current board members of the Festival of Regions are Susanne Blaimschein (curator and exhibition organizer), Dagmar Höss (artist, curator and art communicator) and Gerald Priewasser (artist and the designer). Festival artistic director: Gottfried Hattinger, Festival business manager: Barbara Mitterlehner, Communication and production: Thomas Kreiseder
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