Visual AIDS invites artists and filmmakers to submit proposals for new video works responding to the ongoing HIV and AIDS crisis. Videos will premiere on December 1, 2023 at over 100 venues worldwide as part of Day With(out) Art / World AIDS Day.
Up to six selected artists will receive a $3,000 honorarium to produce a short video work (5–7 minutes).
Proposals will be reviewed by a jury including writer Kimberly Drew and artists Marguerite Van Cook, Charan Singh, and Pato Hebert.
To apply, please submit a 250 word video proposal, an artist statement, work sample, and a CV through the Google Form below. (A Google account is required to apply.)
DEADLINE EXTENDED: Sunday, July 17, 11:59PM EDT
This year we are accepting proposals from artists and filmmakers for short video works that respond to the theme: Everyone I Know Is Sick. We are particularly interested in proposals that consider:
HIV and AIDS as a chronic illness or within a disability justice framework
Connections between HIV and other forms of illness and disability
Themes of sickness, care, and medicine in the wake of multiple pandemics, including HIV/AIDS and COVID-19.
How conversations around HIV and AIDS have been reshaped by our collective experience of the coronavirus pandemic
The experience of immunocompromised people living through multiple simultaneous epidemics
Proposals need not be limited to the above topics, but should respond in some way to the theme. The phrase "everyone I know is sick" is inspired by a statement by Cyrée Jarelle Johnson in the book Black Futures:
Abled people are always telling me, "In the future we’ll all be sick" or that disability is the most likely result of climate catastrophe. And I’m like, everyone I know is already sick. Most of the people I know are already disabled. Whether through illness, injury, trauma, congenital disabilities—all of those. Being disabled can be like seeing into the earth's future. We already know what isolation and scarcity look like, and their consequences. We survived the eugenics, drank the poisoned water, swallowed the pills when no one could know the results. I think that disabled people already know how to remain resilient against the disabling future to come.
We welcome proposals from both emerging and established artists in a range of forms, including documentary, narrative, and experimental. Collaborative proposals are also welcome.
Anyone may submit a proposal, regardless of geographic location or HIV status. Artists and filmmakers who are living with HIV are encouraged to apply.
Proposals should be submitted in English, but videos can be in any language. Visual AIDS will work with artists to produce English subtitles.
Proposals will be reviewed by a jury including writer Kimberly Drew and artists Marguerite Van Cook, Charan Singh, and Pato Hebert. Jurors will evaluate proposals based on the following criteria:
DEADLINE EXTENDED: Sunday, July 17, 11:59PM EDT
All applicants will be notified by September 2022
Commissioned videos must be delivered by July 1, 2023. Artists will be expected to independently manage the production of their work while incorporating feedback from Visual AIDS staff throughout the process.
Videos will premiere at over 100 venues worldwide on December 1, 2023 to mark Day With(out) Art / World AIDS Day. After December 1, commissioned videos will be made available for free online viewing at video.visualaids.org.
If you have any questions about the application process, please email Blake Paskal, Programs Associate at bpaskal@visualaids.org and Kyle Croft, Visual AIDS Programs Director at kcroft@visualaids.org.
Visual AIDS has organized Day With(out) Art every year since 1989, coordinating art museums, galleries, and nonprofits across the world to present programs in response to the AIDS crisis.
Since 2014, Visual AIDS has commissioned short videos from artists and activists to be distributed and screened at venues worldwide on December 1, World AIDS Day. An archive of videos commissioned by Visual AIDS is available at video.visualaids.org.
Past Day With(out) Art projects have featured video works by Thomas Allen Harris, Lyle Ashton Harris, Shanti Avirgan, Mykki Blanco, Jorge Bordello, Katherine Cheairs, Gevi Dimitrakopoulou, Cheryl Dunye, Lucía Egaña Rojas, Rhys Ernst, Glen Fogel, Carl George, Cristóbal Guerra, Jim Hodges, Jim Hubbard, Las Indetectables, Tom Kalin, Danny Kilbride, Kia LaBeija, Carol Leigh / Scarlot Harlot, Luna Luis Ortiz, Ray Navarro, Tiona Nekkia McClodden, My Barbarian, Abdul-Aliy A. Muhammad and Uriah Bussey, Nguyen Tan Hoang, Beto Pérez, Brontez Purnell, Viva Ruiz, Mark S. King, Ira Sachs, Iman Shervington, Charan Singh, Ellen Spiro, George Stanley Nsamba, Nelson Sullivan, Steed Taylor, J Triangular and the Women's Video Support Project, Justin B. Terry-Smith, Julie Tolentino, Tourmaline, Jack Waters and Victor F.M. Torres, James Wentzy, and Derrick Woods-Morrow.
* Note: Information about the video program for Day With(out) Art 2022 has been announced here. This call for proposals is for Day With(out) Art 2023.
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