SAF Call for 2022 Production Programme Artists
Sharjah Art Foundation announces an open call for its Production Programme, which will award a total of 200,000 USD to projects in this application cycle.
Artists, Collectives and Collaborative Groups are Invited to Propose Ambitious Projects In Sculpture, Installation, Time-Based Media, Artist Books and Performance
The Foundation’s Production Programme broadens the possibilities for the production of art in the MENASA region by supporting innovation and excellence in artistic practice through the encouragement of experimentation and risk-taking.
The past decade has seen an extraordinary rise in artistic activity throughout the Middle East, resulting in increased visibility for artists, both regionally and internationally. Within this context, Sharjah Art Foundation hopes to promote and encourage an environment of public and private patronage for the highest level of artistic endeavour.
The Foundation’s Production Programme furthers this goal by supporting artists in their individual attempts to create meaningful and significant work.
In 2022, Sharjah Art Foundation is offering production grants to artists working in a range of media, including sculpture, installation, time-based media, artist’s books and performance.
The success of a proposal will be determined by merit rather than budget, and projects with budgets ranging from modest to ambitious will be considered. The submission deadline is 10 February 2022, and selections will be announced in March 2022.
Art practitioners are invited to propose imaginative, ambitious and inspirational projects that will transform our understanding of art and how it can be experienced. With this initiative, Sharjah Art Foundation hopes to engage and challenge artists and audiences aesthetically, intellectually, emotionally, socially and politically.
The Production Programme was launched in 2009 in conjunction with Sharjah Biennial 9. Past Production Programme grant cycles have made significant contributions to the rise in artistic activity throughout the region and beyond.
Many of the resulting projects have been presented by organisations around the world, contributing to increased visibility and awareness of the grantees’ practices.
Examples include 2010 grantees CAMP and Bani Abidi whose projects premiered at dOCUMENTA (13); 2012 grantee Sean Gullette whose film Traitors premiered at the 2013 Venice Film Festival; Lindsay Seers’ Nowhere Less Now presented in London by Artangel and now part of the Artangel Collection at Tate; 2014 grantee Jumana Manna’s film A Magical Substance Flows into Me premiered as part of her solo exhibition at London’s Chisenhale Gallery in 2015; 2016 grantee Khaled Sabsabi’s Bring the Silence, included in the 21st Biennale of Sydney; and 2018 grantee Mounira Al Solh whose work Freedom is a Habit I am Trying to Learn was avant-premiered at the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven in 2019.
The 2020 grantees were Jumana Emil Abboud, Mohamed Abdelkarim, Noor Abuarafeh, Basma al-Sharif, Abdessamad El Montassir, Köken Ergun, Pak Khawateen Painting Club, Moad Musbahi, Philip Rizk and Subversive Film.
Production Programme grants are among a growing number of year-round opportunities and programmes offered by Sharjah Art Foundation to support artists and art practitioners in the production and development of new creative work, including curatorial residencies and grants for the creation of short films and publishing projects.
