Torf

The Tagvverk Torf Prize is an occasional microgrant given by Tagvverk.

Tagvverk editors select one creative project proposal and grant a fund of $150.00 USD to support the completion of this work, which will be debuted on our site.

Extended research projects, PDF chapbooks, video works, recordings, websites, conceptual and social practice pieces, and travelogues fall within our parameters of interest; however, we are also interested in being challenged and surprised by the submissions we receive.

Women, LGBTQ, people of color, and those with disabilities will be given special consideration.

Think outside the white cube. As always, we seek work that reflects and engages with our contemporary moment. In these times, we are invested in nurturing and supporting creative ideas that challenge, reconfigure, or disrupt.

Let us invest in your voice. There is no (nor will there ever be a) fee for submission.

Submissions are currently closed. Information about our selected project is forthcoming. Thank you to everyone who submitted proposals.

The Tagvverk Torf Prize is made possible, in part, by funds from Rhizome.

More information and links to Torf-funded projects by artists Stevie Ada Klaark and Justine Lai below.

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Tagvverk is pleased to announce the winner of the second Torf microgrant prize.

Interdisciplinary artist Stevie Ada Klaark will use the grant to complete a durational project,
entitled the sea is not an ocean.

More information on the project below. Thanks to everyone for submitting project proposals.
We had many excellent submissions.

Stay tuned for more opportunities.
 

 
 
the sea is not an ocean is a durational sound and composition-based project that is hinged on incremental, 11-second daily recordings made for one year of my daily lap swim at the local pool. The beginning date of this project will be October 1, 2019 and the ending date of recording will be October 1, 2020. At the end of the year, I will have 40 minutes and 15-seconds of sound that will become the score for compositions played on-site at indoor and outdoor pools by solo musicians who I will collaborate with. The onsite events will be documented but not recorded. Sites will be chosen throughout the year, with the first performance scheduled for January 2021. Performance sites will be local, national, and international in scope.

Over the course of the year, beginning on October 1, 2019, the 11-second sound clip from the day before will be uploaded in the morning of the day after its recording. So, uploading of the recordings will begin the morning of October 2, 2019. I consider these sound clips to be “readable” in a similar way as text; the idea being that the sounds will become a text/language/composition.

 
STEVIE ADA KLAARK holds an MFA from Cornell University, College of Architecture, Art, and Planning (AAP) and a Post Baccalaureate from The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and Tufts University. Her work has been featured in Chicago Review, Bat City Review, Blue Mesa Review, Studio Visit Magazine, and on BOOOOOOOM!. She has exhibited internationally at Biquini Wax EPS, Mexico City, Mexico; Hús Hákarla Jörundar, Hrísey, Iceland; and Milk Glass Co., Toronto, ON, Canada. Klaark has been artist-in-residence at Vermont Studio Center, Johnson VT; Zen Mountain Monastery, Mt. Tremper, NY; and Contemporary Artists Center at Woodside, Troy, NY. She has been an Instructor at Cornell University, Cornell Prison Education Program (CPEP) in Ithaca, NY, and an Educator at Marwen in Chicago, IL. Klaark is the recipient of the Tagvverk Torf Grant and the Hemera Foundation Tending Space Fellowship. She was born in the White Sands Desert, in New Mexico, and presently lives and works in Minneapolis, MN.

 
 
 
  
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Tagvverk is pleased to announce the winner of the first Torf microgrant prize.

Artist Justine Lai will use the grant to complete an internet-based project.

More information on the project below. Thanks to everyone for submitting project proposals. We had many excellent submissions.

Stay tuned for more opportunities.

About Justine’s project:

The Geocities webpage “A Timeline of Prejudices Against Asian-Americans in the History of the United States”–alternately titled “Japanese-American History (1869-1942)”–was created by 4 high school students in 1998. Its authors used h3 headings for each historical event, but omitted the end tags. The result is headings nested within headings: text that grows exponentially large when displayed in contemporary browsers. The proposed project will use this timeline and incorporate imagery from my research on Japanese American WW2 incarceration. I’ve amassed hundreds of photos over the years from eBay auctions of camp artifacts and ephemera. The work will be realized as a website and a set of videos/animations.