bi-PARADISE: Opencall

bi-

bi- is an improper biennial.

It happens in unpredictable places, more than twice a year. As if not enough, it starts to infect and parasite other artist residencies; bi- is contagious.

bi- is viral but it is not visible. bi- has an imperceptible budget but a real economy, bi- is broke but gets to travel. bi- comes and goes but takes up residence. bi- is a residency but it is not private. bi- is private but it is not property. bi- is proper but not organized. bi- is messy but does care, bi- has a blurry curatorial line but gourmet tastes, has no exhibition venue but a kitchen, no pavilion and probably never will, inefficient communication and not improving, selection with undetectable stakes but no competition, no glossy catalogue but a loose .pdf, few attendants, no entrance fee, an archaic website, no age limit, no nationality, no gender, low experience, rare visitors, no opening hours, a precarious future.

artist residency

At first, bi- was a geodesic line stretching 1.950,61 kilometers across western Europe, a diagonal joining Térénez, a small locality in Finistère, with Milo, a village on the mountainside of Etna. We used to walk this line, but this summer it broke in mid-air and we fell in Cézens, a village sitting 1.100 meters high on the massif of Cantal. There, we entered a cavity, crawled through a hollow path, and in the most improbable way ended up on the other side of the planet. We found ourselves in Matsudo, in the outskirts of Tokyo. Probably being puzzled and intrigued by these strange folks, PARADISE AIR team offered us shelter, opening the doors of their former love hotel.

As usual, bi- started infecting their surroundings with laziness, making a residency out of this new dwelling, 10.059,14 kilometers from its last shelter.

ビ is contagious but discreet, and mimics its surroundings: in this case a former hotel.

Hence, during bi-PARADISE residency you will be imposed no programme, no theme, no tutoring; proposed no grants, no studio, no insurance, few equipment; offered no exhibition, no glossy catalogue, no press coverage. You will be asked no educational workshops, no artistic research, no art production. You will be requested no signature on any record, no id number or passport copy, no recommendation or credentials, no company registration number, no resort or application fee, no down payment.

ビ PARADISE residency is free of charge and does not accept visibility as a currency, nor will remunerate you with. bi-PARADISE will not peek in your phone nor will share your posts on Insta. bi- does not have an Insta. No-one will see you enter, nor exit; no-one will ask with whom you shared your time, and for what purpose.

Thanks to PARADISE AIR in Matsudo, ビ offers all meals and drinks, facilities with rather safe drinking water and dubious air quality, accommodation in shared theme rooms, two kitchens, whirlpool bath, internet connection, a large lounge area, endemic pears, easy access to pachinko slot machines and Shintoist shrines, meandering access to Tokyo (Tokyo Skytree, Disneyland, Museum of Western Art, Meguro Parasitological Museum), a printer, blocked view on the Edo river.

bi-PARADISE does not cover travel and visa expenses; an invitation to support external funding can be issued.

open call

The residency is proposed for 8-12 idle artists, paperback writers, vernacular architects, abstract practitioners, self-taught librarians, full-time karaoke singers, monolingual translators, limping archaeologists, bilingual woodworkers, ill‑mannered ballet dancers, social‑media deserters, left‑handed flight attendants, employed poets, communist polyamourous yogis, childish gambino, all repentant managers and cursed insurance inspectors, real-estate road-runners, non-binary hackers, anarchist lawyers, ayurvedic thugs, organic-fair-trade-permacultureeco-sustainable stutterers, impatient waiters, zapatist nuclear physicists, blind video-game referees, augmented-reality marroons, dyslexic high-frequency trading algorithms, claustrophobic lift operators, witches and bakers, sankarist horse‑riders, jobless bailiffs, whistle blowers, cosmetic interventions, unoccupied domains, etc.

The residencies in Matsudo will take place during these periods:

21st – 27th of October
28th of October – 3rd of November

Due to the feverish timetable and labour conditions, the selection will be carried out in real time during the open call: the applications will be screened upon receipt. When the capacity is reached, the open call will be closed. We expect that to last roughly a week: therefore we suggest you not to wait too long.

To book, please send an email to bi-@paradiseair.info, specifying a preference for a time slot. The email should contain no attached file (no resume, no portfolio, no project, no motivation letter, no reference letter, no application form, nor any other document explaining the candidate’s practice).

［PDF］bi-PARADISE Open call