Smack Mellon is excited to announce our second evening of 5MAX, a series of online events to keep conversations going in our diverse arts communities. These are evenings of sharing artwork and networking, with an eye to widening our community’s connections during this period of social distancing. Open to everyone, these evenings are especially for artists who want to see and show new work. Our next installment is happening Thursday, July 2 at 6:00PM EDT.
This upcoming event will feature the following artists:
The 5MAX events consist of a two-part program, to take place on alternating weeks. First, in an open Zoom meeting, 5 presenting artists selected by Smack Mellon will each show their work for 5 minutes followed by 5 minutes of audience questions with each artist. Audience members then have the option to sign up for a chance to participate in a closed group meeting with one of the 5 presenting artists, to take place on the following week (Thursday, July 9 at 6:00PM EDT).
In the first part of the event, which will happen live on July 2, the selected presenting artists will each give a presentation that is strictly limited to 5 minutes maximum, followed by 5 minutes of questions – so the pace will be lively. For the second part, each artist will facilitate a subsequent online event one week later, on July 9, with fellow artists who want to share their work and who have a special interest in the presenting artist’s topics, media of choice, artistic practice, or identities. Enrollment to these closed groups is strictly limited to 5 people from the sign-ups made available after the initial 5MAX evening. In the closed group meetings, each participant will also give a 5-minute presentation of their work followed by a 5-minute discussion, and there will be some time for open discussion after all of the presentations. Given the limited number of slots available to presenters in the closed groups, please sign up early. To sign up you will submit images of your work or video through a Submittable application. Submissions will close when all the spots have been filled. Artists will be notified if they secure a spot in one of the closed group meetings. An important part of Smack Mellon’s mission is to support women and under-recognized artists, and as such we strive to include a diverse group of artists who are at least 60% women in all of our programming.
The program is free and open to all. If you are able to give, we are asking for a $10 suggested donation. Given the significant loss of income we have had, any amount that you may be able to donate would help us immensely in supporting our efforts to provide programming to our community.
Zoom meeting instructions for 5MAX will be emailed on the day of the event to our subscriber list, so please make sure to sign up to receive our newsletters here. After the initial event, instructions to submit to attend closed group meetings are here.
Captioning for people with hearing impairment will be provided via Otter Live Notes. To access the live transcript in the Zoom meeting, click the red LIVE indicator and then select “View Stream on Otter.ai Live Notes” in the dropdown. The live transcript will open in a separate browser window.
We give our thanks to Ward Shelley for designing these visuals.
Image above – Clockwise from top left: Michael Paul Britto, Florencia Escudero/photo by Itzel Alejandra Martinez, Rotem Linial, Liz Collins/photo by Allison Michael Orenstein, Cecile Chong/photo by Gaby Deimeke.
This project is made possible with funds from the NYSCA Electronic Media/Film in Partnership with Wave Farm: Media Arts Assistance Fund, with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.