Material Library: Open Call
This open call invites contributions to the material library component of Material Acts: Experimentation in Architecture and Design, an upcoming exhibition opening September 28 at Craft Contemporary in Los Angeles, CA. Designers, artists, and other makers are encouraged to submit experimental material samples from their practices for possible inclusion in the exhibition’s material library.
Material Acts examines the role of nature in material experiments across the domains of architecture, craft, and science. While nature has often stood in as a model, metaphor, or resource for designers, the recent global upheavals in climate, ecology, and technology are driving intensified understandings of nature’s tangible and imagined substrate. The exhibition will examine how contemporary design practices mobilize, confound, and generate natures, whether through simulating mechanics or growing biological matter.
For the material library, we invite individuals and collaborators of various levels of expertise to submit samples of materials that they have created through their practices, trials, or research.
Whether experimentations in chemical reactions, design with scoby, environment-reactive metals, bio-calcified foam, woven earth fibers, or other mobilizations of matters, this call aims to highlight material explorations and advancements in contemporary design practices—as well as the material accidents that happen along the way. We welcome the outcomes of diverse sites of crafting and fabrication, from the backyard, to the kitchen sink, to the lab hood booth.
The material library will operate as a part of the exhibition, in one of the main galleries, allowing for hands-on encounters and experiential learning to showcase the rich milieu across contemporary sites of material production. All samples selected for inclusion in the library will be displayed together on a collection of shelves, tables, and other interpretative surfaces.
Submission Guidelines and Eligibility
The form will ask you to:
- Briefly describe your material, its makeup, process of production, and possible utilizations.
- Provide material dimensions (Please see below for size and weight guidelines.)
- Submit photographs that show both the materiality of the sample and its scale.
- Confirm whether your sample is safe to be touched by audience members.
- Provide any additional comments or questions.
Acceptance of your material sample(s) into the library will be determined by the curatorial team to ensure all samples support the exhibition thematics and fit the submission guidelines. The project team can provide a prepaid shipping label for submissions that meet the shipping requirements listed below. Samples will be displayed in the state and format in which we receive them. Please package your sample as it will be displayed. All samples must be safely handled by museum staff.
Underrepresented practices, as well as practices outside well-funded circuits of academic research, are encouraged to apply. Material Acts has a limited pool of funding to support international shipping. With international shipping rates and timelines taken into consideration, we will work with accepted material samples from international practices on a case-by-case basis.
Size Guidelines and Shipping
Maximum size requirement: 11 ¼” (L) x 8 ¾” (W) x 6” (H), in order to fit within a standard flat rate medium box.
Weight limit: 15 lb.
All material samples should adhere to USPS regulations on hazardous, restricted, and perishable mail. Non-hazardous liquids and powders can be mailed if they are properly packaged and sealed in a waterproof or sift-proof container. The outer of packages containing liquids should be marked to indicate the nature of the contents, and include orientation arrows. Please review USPS regulations for full details.
Further shipping instructions and timeline will be provided upon acceptance of submission.
Return shipment of samples will not be available.
Weight limit: 15 lb.
All material samples should adhere to USPS regulations on hazardous, restricted, and perishable mail. Non-hazardous liquids and powders can be mailed if they are properly packaged and sealed in a waterproof or sift-proof container. The outer of packages containing liquids should be marked to indicate the nature of the contents, and include orientation arrows. Please review USPS regulations for full details.
Further shipping instructions and timeline will be provided upon acceptance of submission.
Return shipment of samples will not be available.
Timeline
- Submissions open July 15, 2024.
- Deadline for material submissions is
August 12, 2024 at 11:59pm PSTEXTENDED TO August 19, 2024 at 11:59pm PST. - Notice of acceptance will be on a rolling basis with latest confirmation of acceptance by Friday August 16, 2024.
- US-based material samples should be mailed no later than August 27, 2022.
- Non-US based material samples will need to be mailed earlier; to be determined case by case.
Please contact us at materialacts@gmail.com with any questions.