Featured Artist Program Call w/ Juror Nicky Ni
The Featured Artist Program at Cultivate serves to elevate and amplify the artist's work and process with the community, inviting them to understand how and why an artist creates the work they do, to market and promote artists, and to connect artists to each other and to our network of curators, artists, and gallery owners.
The feature includes a web publication, Instagram posts and stories, as well as additional social media coverage. We will select 12 artists to share in this series. We will also be making an exhibition catalog of this cohort. The artists and work selected will be a representation of the work exhibited in our gallery.
Benefits of being a Cultivate Featured artist include:
Connection to our vast network of artists, curators, gallery owners, and collectors
Heavy promotion in our newsletter, web publication, and social media
Exhibition Catalog made of these selected artists
Artists are selected in every January and June, and scheduled out for the six-month period with each month featuring a different artist.
Selected artists for this cohort will be notified by June 9.
Timeline of Work:
April 17, 2023 - Open Call for Artists
May 19, 2023 - Call Ends
June 2 - June 9, 2023 - Artists are notified
Between June 2-June 16, selected artists answer interview questions
Between June 16-December 29, 2023, two artists a month will be shared in the web publication and also in the exhibition catalog for this cohort.
Questions and media should be directed to hello@cultivategrandrapids.org
Meet our Juror: Nicky Ni
A Chinese expat living in Chicago, Nicky Ni writes and curates exhibitions and screenings. She is currently Curatorial Resident at Chicago Artists Coalition, Editor at Sixty Inches From Center, and Programmer for Onion City Experimental Film Festival (a production of Chicago Filmmakers). She is co-founder of LITHIUM (2017-19), a gallery dedicated to time-based art in the Pilsen neighborhood. LITHIUM then became TNL (aka. The Neu Lithium), an online editorial and curatorial platform for time-based and media art. Additionally, she has curated exhibitions or screenings at Conversations at the Edge, Mana Contemporary, Museum of Contemporary Photography, SITE Galleries, 062, and other venues. Her writing has appeared on Chicago Reader, Sixty Inches from Center, Newcity, Call for Curators, Chicago Artist Writers. Nicky’s past residencies include Full Spectrum Curatorship Programme at IMPAKT Centre for Media Culture (Online/Utrecht, NL); and Momus Emerging Art Critics Residency (Online/CA). Nicky received her M.A. degree in Art History and Arts Administration from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a B.S. degree in Industrial Engineering and French from Northwestern University. When not working, Nicky enjoys geeking out on coffee, exploring vegan cooking and listening to electronic music.
