Azernews.Az

By Nigar Orujova

YARAT! Contemporary Art Space, an organization dedicated to promoting Azerbaijani contemporary art locally and worldwide, invites artists to participate in a new Public Art 2013 project, which will be launched in late February, the YARAT! website said.

The festival will heed attention to shedding light upon the issues of modern art in metropolitan cities and will allow implementing ten projects proposed either by an individual artist or by a group of painters.

The project applicants have to be practicing artists who are at least 20 years old and manage to provide a solid proof of personal accomplishments through participation at art shows.

All bids to be submitted should stand out for their interactive nature. The design of Festival managers contemplates constant interaction between an artist and the audience, which is going to get involved in the creative process.

Visitors' participation is an indispensable and integral component of the art pieces, and it is spectators who will contribute to the implementation of all projects by specific action.

The artists taking part in the project will themselves select the means of their participation and topics. While some artists would like to present their curated projects, others will prefer to create music-based artworks.

The key principle YARAT! adheres to is interactivity of the process, i.e. a situation when a visitor is capable of influencing the course of the events and creative process, as this not only depends on inspiration and imaginativeness an artist possesses, but is also affected by the environment he/she works in and the surrounding people.

Five of the ten project proposals will be selected from the most outstanding applications submitted by foreign nationals. The upcoming event is distinguished by its being held at the regional level.

The previous such festival, organized with the support of Old City Administration, Baku Boulevard Administration, Bank Standard and cellular operator Azercell and completed in August 2012, proved that there is a great need for such initiatives in Azerbaijan.

The artwork presentations held within the eight-month 012 Baku Public Art Festival became a pleasant tradition, which has fascinated both Baku residents and visitors of the capital city.

During the previous festival, every exhibited sculptural composition or item immediately became talking points and an attraction for the city residents.

Founded in 2011 by Aida Mahmudova, YARAT! has the key objective of encouraging dialogue and exchanges with non-commercial art foundations both in Azerbaijan and abroad.