[Frameworks] submissions! portland gallery and art co-op

[Katya Yakubov]

Dear Frameworks community,

For the past nine months, I have been city-hopping in a Uhaul van, with my boyfriend and two dogs, across these States of America. After a long detour in Los Angeles, we now find ourselves in Portland, Oregon. We have just signed a lease for a beautiful loft space which we hope to convert into an Art Co-op and Film Library.

What the co-op will hold:

+ A peer to peer equipment and services exchange
+ Screening nights, suggested by people in the community or artists wanting to show their own or someone else's works. This can include guest screening, artist talks, and other such "event nights."
+ A gallery space with open submissions and rotating art every few weeks.
+ A corollary website containing all the components and services of the physical space. Through the website, users can access community classified boards, see listings of all equipment and media available in the space, look at events calendars, input messages with suggestions for future events, and submit their work through online forms, etc).
+ And now, for the most important one, for which I am emailing all you wonderful people about… An experimental film library. I have for a long time wanted to see available a contemporary, working-artist catalog of film and video works to inspire and conspire artists. This library will expose works that might only be seen at hard to reach festivals, university libraries, and pixelated website screens. With the older avant-garde works on professionally remastered and distributed DVDs, I find that it is the most frustrating to find films of artists who are working now.

That being said, donate a copy of your films! Of your books! Of your work! I know this listserv has amazing and established artists who might not be in need of exposure, but even so, here is a free space to show your work, and be part of something.

Please help! We do not have many resources and want to spawn this little space to life based on whatever the community wants and provides. The goal is to give the community a space to influence and shape on its own, without any profit model or specific plan in mind. I know that the things that have inspired me the most have been spaces that came together not because of a top-down, organized, money-infused establishment, but rather an organic, user-generated osmosis of ideas, love, and creativity, which boldly works with the resources it has, even when it has few.

And a pre-post-script: A huge shout out to the Echo Park Film Center in Los Angeles, CA, one of the places that inspired us to stay in L.A. for as long as we did, and the center that does so many great things without the big names or big funds other venues might have. You guys are awesome!

Thanks for reading! Any input is highly appreciated.

--Katya

The address to send any works:
	537 SE Ash Street, Suite 206
	Portland, OR 97214
My little website: www.paperfilm.org
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