24th Annual NO DEAD ARTISTS: International Juried Exhibition of Contemporary Art

CALL FOR ARTIST SUBMISSIONS 2020

JONATHAN FERRARA GALLERY proudly hosts an annual call for artists for the 24th Annual NO DEAD ARTISTS: International Juried Exhibition of Contemporary Art. The call is open through 17 JUNE 2020 and the exhibition participants are selected by an ever-changing group of three prestigious arts professionals. The exhibition itself is installed in the gallery for the entire month of September with an opening reception in conjunction with the Arts District New Orleans' First Saturday Gallery Openings on 5 September 2020, 6-9pm.

The exhibition was created in 1995 to give a voice to emerging artists. NO DEAD ARTISTS has become an exhibition that has time and again discovered new and emerging talent and is one of the most celebrated art exhibitions in the South. 

The exhibition's name is derived from the old adage that artists never achieve success until they are dead. NO DEAD ARTISTS turns that notion on its head and gives emerging artists their first break in the art world. In the '90s, the exhibition was open only to New Orleans artists and subsequently grew to include artists of Louisiana. In 2010, the exhibition expanded to become a national juried exhibition open to artists from the entire United States and the call went international in 2014.

Each year, hundreds of artists submit thousands of works with the hope of being in the select few to exhibit at JONATHAN FERRARA GALLERY. The exhibition is reviewed annually by D. Eric Bookhardt (Artpapers and Gambit Weekly). The opening reception marks the beginning of the arts season in New Orleans and is attended by thousands of art enthusiasts. 

The exhibition has been a springboard for numerous artists leading to national press coverage, recognition, gallery representation and acquisitions by museums and other prominent collections. Each year the gallery invites a panel of renowned arts professionals and collectors to select the newest creative talents.

As the GRAND PRIZE, one jury-winning artist is awarded a solo exhibition at JONATHAN FERRARA GALLERY to take place the following year.

2020 IMPORTANT DATES

17 JUNE ::: SUBMISSION DEADLINE 

18 JULY ::: FINALISTS ANNOUNCEMENT

5 SEPTEMBER ::: EXHIBITION OPENING RECEPTION

25 SEPTEMBER ::: EXHIBITION CLOSES

entry instructions :::

NO DEAD ARTISTS is an INTERNATIONAL OPEN CALL FOR ARTISTS, open to living artists of all ages, emerging and established, working throughout the world. All mediums are accepted including, but not limited to, painting, sculpture, design, glass, metalwork, photography, video, performance, mixed media and installation art. 

Each application must be accompanied by an ENTRY FEE of $35.00 made through Paypal once you have completed the submission process. 

Each entrant is allotted up to five image/video submissions and three details for each. All images must be in .jpg format and videos in .mov format. All works must be for sale. 

Any winning entry will be subject to a standard 50% gallery sales commission in the event that it is sold. 

The artist is responsible for ALL shipping costs including return shipping of all unsold work and import/export duties and taxes.

2020 JURORS

NATO THOMPSON

Nato Thompson is a curator, author, and The Sueyun and Gene Locks Artistic Director at Philadelphia Contemporary. Philadelphia Contemporary is a mobile contemporary art organization in the process of creating a non-collecting museum in the city of Philadelphia. He recently curated the four channel film project by Bradford Young and Elissa Blount Moorehead titled Back and Song, the group show Festival for the People, as well as, a solo artist commission by painter Jane Irish. He has previously worked as Artistic Director at the New York-based public art organization Creative Time, which he joined in January 2007. Since then, Thompson has organized numerous major Creative Time projects. He has also worked as Curator at MASS MoCA, where he completed numerous large-scale exhibitions, including The Interventionists: Art in the Social Sphere (2004), with a catalogue distributed by MIT Press. He has written two books of cultural criticism, Seeing Power: Art and Activism in the 21st Century (2015) and Culture as Weapon: The Art of Influence in Everyday Life published in January 2017.

JESSIE SCHOTT HAYNES

Jessie Schott Haynes is the Managing Director of The Helis Foundation, a private foundation, which administers grants that sustain operations for, provide free admission to, and acquires significant works of art on behalf of major institutions within the Metropolitan New Orleans area.  She is responsible for ensuring that the Helis Family’s commitment to creating access to public art is fulfilled by managing public sculpture acquisition and exhibition throughout the City as well as implementation of and oversight of programs such as  Art for All.  Haynes earned a B.A. in both English and Art History from Newcomb College at Tulane University and a juris doctor from Loyola University New Orleans College of Law.  She serves as a Trustee of the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, and a Board member of the Arts Council New Orleans, the Preservation Resource Center, and the Bureau of Governmental Research.    

CAREY MACK WEBER

Carey Mack Weber has over 25 years of experience working in museums and galleries. Carey spent over a decade working in fine art galleries in New York City, notably serving as Director of  Susan Sheehan Inc. and Edward Tyler Nahem Fine Art. She was integral to the founding of the Bellarmine Museum of Art, and has served as Executive Director of the Fairfield University Art Museum since January 2019. Carey is currently serving her 5th year as President of the Connecticut Art Trail, a nationally recognized partnership between twenty-one world-class museums and historic sites.

Past jurors have included Prospect.1 Founder and Curator, Dan Cameron; Museum Director, Billie Milam Weisman; Collector and Philanthropist, Beth Rudin DeWoody; MacArthur Fellow, John Scott; Whitney Trustee and Ballroom Marfa Co-founder, Fairfax Dorn; NOMA Director, Susan Taylor; artist, Tony Fitzpatrick; Director of the Andy Warhol Museum, Eric Shiner; Director of the National Art Gallery of the Bahamas and Founder and Artistic Director of the VOLTA Fair, Amanda Coulson; Dishman Art Museum Director, Megan Koza Young; ArtBridge Curator, Jordana Zeldin; MoMA Board Member, Lawrence Benenson; Brooklyn Museum of Art Board Member, Stephanie Ingrassia; Collector, Nick Mayor; Director of the Contemporary Arts Museum of Houston, Bill Arning; Associate Curator at the Contemporary Jewish Museum (San Francisco), Anastasia James; Perez Art Museum (Miami) Director, Franklin Sirmans; prestigious collector, Lester Marks (Houston); Joan Mitchell Center Director, Gia Hamilton; collector / principle of the Francis H. Williams Collection, Francis H. Williams; Head of Curatorial Affairs at the McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas, René Paul Barilleaux; and actress, collector and art advocate, CCH Pounder; Dean of the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts at Washington University, Carmon Colangelo; Art advisor at Matthew Clayton Brown, Robyn Dunn Schwarz and Executive Vice President of Art Miami LLC, Nick Korniloff.