TransCultural Exchange 2016

Artists are natural explorers. The good news for local creators is that one of the leading conferences on international travel and residencies for artists takes place in Boston: the TransCultural Exchange Conference. Through panels, events, and discussions, the event focuses on international opportunities for artists of all disciplines.

Mary Sherman, founder/director of the conference, wants to share the following details with artists who might be interested in attending this year’s event (Feb. 25-27, 2016):

1. More than ½ the attendees in the past can cite a tangible outcome, such as an invite to exhibit or to a residency program – within 6 months of the Conference’s end.

2. We have more than 150 speakers (critics, curators, residency directors) from around the world attending, meaning about 2 speakers per attendee! You can’t get much more personal attention than that. Speakers include:
Ute Meta Bauer (Co-Curator of the American pavilion at the 56th Venice Biennale and Founding Director of NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore), Jean-Baptiste Joly (Founding Director of Akademie Schloss Solitude), Damien Hebron (Director of London Arts in Health Forum), Johan Pousette (Director of Sweden’s IASPIS), Marie Fol (Program Manager of TransArtists at Dutch Culture), Marie Le Sourd (Secretary General of On-the-Move), Pieranna Cavalchini (Curator of Contemporary Art at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum), Susan Hapgood (Executive Director, ISCP (NY’s International Studio & Curatorial Program)Caitlin Strokosch (Executive Director of the Alliance of Artists Communities), Andy Riess (Assistant Director for Outreach for the Fulbright Scholar Program), Dr. Gaël McGill (Director of Molecular Visualization at the Center for Molecular and Cellular Dynamics at Harvard Medical School), Yannick Franck (Artistic Director of Belgium’s Les Brasseurs), Margaret Shiu Tan (Founder of Taiwan’s Bamboo Curtain Studio), Andrei Siclodi (Director of Austria’s Künstlerhaus Büchsenhausen), Sarah Tanguy (Curator at the Art in Embassies program), Kira Simon-Kennedy (Co-Founder of China Residencies), Crispin Weinberg (Biomedical Modeling Pioneer), Lanfranco Aceti (Leonardo Electronic Almanac Editor), Sandeep Bhagwati (founder of the research-creation lab, the matralab) and Kelly Krause (Creative Director of Nature magazine) and on and on.

3. And not only do artists get to hear these people speak, but there are informal receptions to have a drink with them, or to have a portfolio review with them, and/or to attend a round-table discussion for them to meet other artists working in similar fields of interests so they can expand their network locally and globally.

4. Typically, for artists the Conference is tax-deductible.

5. The director of the London Biennale David Medalla states the conference is “one of the best things in the art world today.”

Learn more and register.

Related reading: ArtSake’s post on artist travel/residencies, written after the 2013 conference.