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ANNUAL REPORT 2 0 2 1
CONTENTS 4
2 0 2 1 F E S T I VA L OV E R V I E W
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AU D I E N C E
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AR T I ST S
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AU D I E N C E
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I N T E R N S H I P S + E D U C AT I O N
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C U R R E N T S 8 26
1 6 B OA R D D E V E LO P M E N T 17
FINANCES
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NEW VENUES
2 0 LI N K S
le ft : still f rom P e e p h o l e s b y Mana Me hrab ian ab o ve : P a c h i n k o M a c h i n e b y Brigi t ta Zic s c o ver : still f rom r e m o te / d i s p l a c e d b y quie tSp eaker
PA R A LLEL ST U DIOS 2021 A NNUA L REP ORT
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2021 FE S T I VAL OVERVIEW J U N E 1 8 - 2 7, 2 0 2 1
2021 was CURRENTS’ 12th year as an annual international event. Up until this point, the festival was presented as a large indoor event that attracted 9000 visitors. Because we were still facing an uncertain public health environment, we planned and executed a hybrid solution to keeping CURRENTS alive – an online festival and a scaled down Santa Fe festival, with excellent artists and performers across both platforms. le ft : entr y at C C A S anta F e during CU R R EN TS F e sti val 2 02 1 right : ab oard the v ir tual Rail Runner in our online fe sti val
L I V E I N S A N TA F E The in-person festival took place in 3 venues. The exhibition at the Center for Contemprary Arts, Santa Fe included 14 installations, a video program of shorts by 6 artists, projected videos, and a performance in the CCA theater that was also live streamed through our virtual festival site. At our year round space, CURRENTS 826, we showed the work of 5 artists working with digital printing, a meshing of glass blowing and digital technology, and 2 projections. An augmented reality art walk in the Railyard Park and Plaza brought digital arts to passersby that might not be aware of CURRENTS. The CCA exhibition closed on June 27. The exhibition at CURRENTS 826, was installed through mid-August 2021.
O N L I N E W I T H O H YAY The virtual festival took place on a new platform, Ohyay, developed by SnapChat
during the pandemic, to facilitate online events. As a multiplayer site, you could meet up virtually with your friends no matter what part of the country or world they live in and hangout in facsimiles of one of our local hangouts - Opuntia, Sky Coffee, or the Violet Crown. Most of our usual categories of work were accessible online. In total, the virtual festival presented 49 individual works by 81 individual or collaborating artists, and 15 live streamed performances.
AUDIENCE June was a time of transition. While some pandemic restrictions were lifted, we were still required to use timed entry, limited attendance, and to require masks indoors. Although our usual attendance of 9000 was reduced considerably, considering the state of public health, we had a strong and engaged response to the festival. We heard time and again throughout our 10 days at CCA how grateful people were to be experiencing art and community in person once again. This enthusiasm for live events had the downside of “screen-weariness”--a reticence to engage virtually after a year of lockdown. Because of this, we noticed lower attendance rates in our online festival compared to the solely-online 2020 festival. Regardless, the Santa Fe festival was attended by 1500 people and the virtual festival engaged 2000. le ft : v isi tor s at CU R R EN TS F e sti val 2 02 1, photo b y Br yan Whi tne y ri ght top : installation b y Anne Farre ll, photo b y L ana S alaz ar right b ot tom : v isi tor s at CU R R EN TS F e sti val 2 02 1
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CURRENTS S A N TA F E CCA ARTISTS Sruthi Ammannagari Marc Ainger Morgan Barnard Khieffer Beviz Brenda Bingham Marcus Bonisson Susanna Carlisle Khalil Charif Pablo-Martín Córdoba Michael Curry Rachel Dennis Bill Dolson Anne Farrell Snow Yunxue Fu
Victoria Garrison Federico Cámara Halac Matt Hall Bruce Hamilton Kathy Hinde Ed Kashi Cy Keener Amy Knoles Maryam Khaleghiyazdi Owen Lowery Mana Mehrabian Dennis Michael Ruxandra Mitache William (Billie) Mitchell Ng’endo Mukii Christine Remy
2021 ARTISTS
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Sim Sadler Roberto Santaguida Solveig Settemsdal Afrah Shafiq Cassie Shao Michael Slavich David Stout Kyoung Swearingen Scott Swearingen Dora Tass Sally Weber Mátyás Wettl Bryan Whitney Yuge Zhou Brigitta Zics
S A N TA F E R A I LY A R D
Jonah Hoffman Sam Jones Whitney Jones Rachel Ortiz Theresa Roybal Tomoki Sasaki Starr Woods
CURRENTS 826 Mint Boonyapanachoti Maxime Corbeil-Perron Reilly Donovan Michelle Hessel James Paul Joan Perlman Chris Watson
Ommar Bribiesca Lauren Cason Devon Hoffman
le ft : U m b r e l l a s b y Billie Mi tche ll in the entranc e to C C A right top : T h e r e We r e F o u r o f U s b y Cas sie Shao right b ot tom : G ra m m a i n h e r G a r d e n b y Miche lle He s se l and Mint B o onyapanachoti
PA R A LLEL ST U DIOS 2021 A NNUA L REP ORT
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CURRENTS VIRTUAL Adonia Bouchehri Afrah Shafiq Ainslee Robson Akiko Nakayama Alan Macy, Mark-David Hosale, Alysia Michelle James Amay Kataria, Phil Mulliken
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le ft : A l i v e P a i n t i n g , v ir tual p er formanc e b y Ak iko Nak ayama right : N e u r o m a n t i c b y Ana C. Valle jo
Amy Alexander, Curt Miller Ana Vallejo Anabela Costa Andy Deemer Anna David, West Callanan Benjamin Hall, Jay Darlington Carla Gannis Carole Kim Casey Lewis Farina Dalton Sessumes Devon Hoffman, Rachel Ortiz,
Theresa Roybal, Whitney Jones, Jonah Hoffman, Tomoki Sasaki, Starr Woods, Ommar Bribiesca Elizabeth Leister Elli Papakonstantinou Eva Davidova, Danielle McPhatter, Matthew D. Gantt, Naicha Diabi, Heather Mo’ Witz, Mx. Oops Fabito Rychter, Amir Admoni, Owen Svelmoe
PA R A LLEL ST U DIOS 2021 A NNUA L REP ORT
Gina Collecchia, Eric Heep Gregorio Méndez Jean-René Leblanc Jennifer Traina-Dorge, Amay Kataria João Iñada, Luiz Borges Jody Zellen Joel Ong, Michael Palumbo, Ilze Briede Lance Weiler Lauren Cason, Sam Jones LEVL9 (Sasha Pyle), Julie DeFeo, Jamie Chase Margaret Noble Melanie Courtinat Michael Luo Michelange Quay Morgan Barnard Ng’endo Mukii Nicholas Shaheed Nuntinee Tansrisakul ODC Ensemble + Oliver Griem
still f rom V R Pie c e , U n d e r t h e S k i n b y João Iñada
PROVIDES NG, Eli Joteva, Ya Nzi, Artem Konevskikh quietSpeaker Randall Okita Reynaliz Herrera Richard Hoagland Roberto Santaguida Ruxandra Mitache Sandrine Deumier Shona Kitchen, Alyson Ogasian Sim Sadler Sophie Kahn Stephen Fishman Susan Silas
Vincent Ciciliato, Christophe Havel Wayne Madsen Wenjing Liu Yuguang Zhang, Yuliya Lanina Zahra Sarah, Rasool Springer, Viktorija Mickute, Naima Ramos-Chapman
INTERNSHIPS + E D U C AT I O N While our in-classroom visits and projects were curtailed because of Covid, we went forward with a solely local festival internship program. Normally the program includes both national college level interns and local high school interns. The nine 2021 interns came from a variety of organizations and schools – the NM Commission for the Blind, Santa Fe High, New Mexico School for the Arts, and college students, home for the summer, from schools such as Tufts Museum School. We were grateful for the hard work of our interns, who despite coming into an unprecedented situation, united as a team to produce and staff the 2021 festival. interns E zri, Alder and Vinc ent take a break in Frank ’s truck after unloading at our storage fac ili t y
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ab o ve : C and interns Vinc ent and Annab e lle discus s install top right : intern S amantha prep s walls to b e painte d b ot tom right : E zri, Marianna, S arah and Alder paint
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CURRENTS 826 It has been a great year for Currents 826, our year-round exhibition and experience space. We’re pleased that the space allows us to offer the public the work of artists creating technology based work thoughout the year. We launched an online version of our gift shop, Objects of Fascination, which sells the work of artists who use technology to create small lovely objects to wear and treasure, and games, books and brain twisting puzzles. It has been a goal to bring more visitors into the gallery as a community gathering space and venue, and as
there are dips in COVID case numbers, we have been able to host more in-person events. In May, we held a closing reception for our hologram and projection exhibition, Altered Light, which substituted for the opening reception we were unable to have due to the pandemic. The gallery served as a sattellite exhibtion space for the festival over the summer. In October, Parallel Trajectories, opened with an accompanying screening of work by David Stout, Robert Campbell and Steina Vasulka which drew many attendees. In early December, we hosted our first ever Holiday Market which included 12 local artisans and vendors and brought in over a hundred attendees. This was part of an Upper Canyon Block Party we helped coordinate with neighboring businesses. The event helped establish Currents 826 as not only a gallery, but a community space that supports local artists and the accompanying block party fostered a sense of community along upper Canyon road.
Currently on view is Vibrant Pool, an exhibition showcasing work by three young, New Mexico-based artists. We will be hosting a series of artist talks, walkthroughs and performance nights in the coming months.
2 0 2 1 E X H I B I T I O N S AT C U R R E N T S 8 26 A LT ERED LIGH T Feb 19 - May 23, 2021 Fred Unterseher, August Muth, Joan Stango, C Alex Clark, Dora Tass, Yuge Zhou, Alison Nitkiewicz CURREN T S 20 2 1 @ CURREN T S 8 26 June 18 - September 19, 2021 Afrah Shafiq, Reilly Donovan, Joan Perlman, Maxime Corbeil-Perron, Mint Boonyapanachoti & Michelle Hessel PA R A LLEL T R A J ECTORI E S : W ORK S ON PA PER BY ROBERT C A M PBELL A N D DAV I D STOU T October 2, 2021 - January 2, 2022 Robert Campbell & David Stout
le ft : Mob ius S trip, glas s sculpture b y R e ill y Dono van top right : holo grams b y August Mu th at the G aller y b ot tom right : a quie t moment during the Holiday Marke t
BOARD DEVELOPMENT This has been an exciting, breakthrough year for our Board. 2021 brought us 5 new Board members with a wide range of skills and lots of energy! We are now able to fill much needed committees – Finance, Grant Writing, Education, Membership – that will help support our growth and evolution.
2022 BOARD ANNE FARRELL KITT Y BALLARD-RYAN KEN PROKUSKI TOM GREENBAUM HANNAH KRAMM CHIRSTINE RÉMY JOSE ANDRES ROSERO-CURET KAREN KLEIN BARAK CHAMO JENNY DAY MAX WALUKAS
B oard memb er, Jo se Andre s leading a work shop on N F Ts at Current s 826 in De c emb er, 2 02 1
LOOKING AHEAD: FINANCES Financially, our organization is healthier than ever. Our ability to pivot and reconfigure, stay on our toes about national and state rescue grant options, and the loyalty of our ongoing foundation and government supporters, means that we are emerging from the stresses of the pandemic with renewed strength and vision.
still f rom Demateriali ze d b y S ophie K ahn
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NEW VENUES Securing a 2022 festival venue had its challenges, but has brought on exciting new horizons for the festival. In December 2021, we were informed that our venue of 10 years, El Museo Cultural, would no longer be available to us. After various dead ends and rethinks, we have arrived at a totally new solution that satisfies our need for a large exhibition space. Gratefully, we have been invited to return to the Center for Contemporary Arts. The CCA’s beautiful Tank Garage Gallery was a perfect venue for our 2021 exhibition and we’re excited
f ront entranc e to the C C A Tank G arage , June 2 02 1
to return in 2022. Being that the Tank Garage is a quarter the size of El Museo, we have now also secured 5,000 sq foot space at the Santa Fe County Fairgrounds. The exhibition/warehouse style space is 100% solar powered, and reasonably priced. Its location on the south side of town gives us the opportunity to attract a new audience. There are challenges, of course: a need for an exhibition design that reimagines a space not constructed with new media installations in mind; developing ways to reach out to an expanded audience; creating synergy between the two very different venues. But, the board, staff, and directors of Parallel Studios, seem to be built to meet challenges, thanks in large part to our supportive audience and stellar granting organizations.
top : interior o f the Fairgrounds ware house building b ot tom : the main theater at C C A
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LINKS CURRENTS WEBSITE : currentsnewmedia.org
V I M EO
vimeo.com/user3864456/collections
C U R R E N T S 2 0 2 1 F E S T I VA L
currentsnewmedia.org/festivals/currents-new-media-2021
O N LI N E S H O P currentsshop.org
I N S TAG R A M
instagram.com/currentsnewmedia
Our instagram page is a great way to stay on top o f what ’s happ ening at CU R R EN TS. Thank s to dail y p o sting and ou treach, we are now at almo st 6 000 follower s .
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PA R A LLEL ST U DIOS 2021 A NNUA L REP ORT