BOSTON, MASS.- On June 20, 2020 – the summer/winter solstice –the nonprofit organization
TransCultural Exchange invites art lovers on a (virtual) voyage around the world. With the mere click of a mouse, travelers can check out paintings, music, dances, films and installations by contemporary artists working in Argentina, Australia, Bahrain, Brazil, Canada, China, Egypt, Finland, France, Japan, Norway, Spain, Germany, Morocco, Peru, Poland, Senegal, Turkey and Zambia with countless stops along the way. They can collaborate with art projects from Kyrgyzstan, the UK, US, Brazil and more. The choices are myriad; hundreds of artists and cultural venues from over 70 countries make up the tour.
A bit of background:
Hello World was inspired by the local efforts gallantly being made by artists throughout the world during the COVID-19 pandemic. For instance, the Italian balcony singers, serenading passersby.
Hello World takes this idea to the global level as a way for artists and cultural venues to demonstrate care and concern not only for their close friends, but also for those far away – to signal that we are all in this pandemic together.
Who and How Hello World Works:
Hello World solicited texts, SoundCloud links, jpegs and YouTube/vimeo videos from artists (of all cultures, disciplines, abilities, backgrounds and orientations), residing anywhere in the world. Among those participating are such renown artists as Dorothea Rockburne (USA), Joaquin Fargas (Argentina), Josely Carvalho (Brazil), Shaarbek Amankul (Kyrgyzstan), The Wahapahapa Band (Tanzania), Chun-Hao Chen (Taiwan), Sawad Brooks (USA), Arthur Ganson (USA) and Lloyd Schwartz (USA). (The complete list to date is here: http://transculturalexchange.org/activities/hw/artists.htm.)
At the same time, Hello World and the participating artists gathered together names and websites of arts and cultural venues throughout the world who have agreed to post a link to Hello World on their website. They will do this on the day of the launch, as a tribute of solidarity with their colleagues around the globe. The list of participating venues to date is listed here: http://transculturalexchange.org/activities/hw/venues.htm They include: Theater without Borders, The International Association of Art (UNESCO Official Partner), PICA (Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts), Flux-News, the Art Gallery of International University of Sarajevo, Union of Bulgarian Artists, Radio SUBMARINE (Egypt), Radio Dordogne France, Bucharest International Dance Film Festival, SANAVA (South Africa National Association for the Visual Arts), artists-in-labs, Taipei Artist Village, Museum Making of Ukrainian Nation, The Venezuelan Association of Plastic Artists – AVAP, Southlondonmuseum (SLM), Center for Research and Teaching Excellence (CRASE) at the University of San Francisco, Diaspora Vibe Cultural Arts Incubator (DVCAI), MIT Program in Art, Culture and Technology (ACT), Ewing Gallery of Art at the University of Tennessee Knoxville and the George Washington Carver Museum, among hundreds more.
When: On June 20th, 2020, the project’s launch date, Hello World will have uploaded all the participating artists’ projects and will broadcast the project to the entire global community (through Hello World and the hundreds of participating venues’ websites).
Why? Hello World aims
1. To sustain people-to-people interactions within and beyond borders, during this period of travel restrictions and social distancing.
2. To provide artists and many in the arts and cultural community more visibility during this difficult time of limited operations.
3. To address the isolation, loss and fear resulting from the pandemic’s decrease in our usual sources of solace – the arts, a connection with others and non-threatening interactions with those outside our usual sphere.
4. To help encourage a global mindset to stem the rising nationalism, discrimination and other extremist tendencies that often results when people feel scared or stressed.
