BECA: About

About the BECA Foundation:

The BECA Foundation is an artist + designer run (and thus far, volunteer-run), not-for-profit global arts + design project benefiting artists, designers and the public. It entered its 4th year of international public arts programming this past January 2011. BECA now maintains its global headquarters in Albuquerque, NM, USA. For the past 3 years, BECA has exercised a unique, year-round, international, open-call submission policy for blind jury and blind curatorial review. Unlike most traditional non-profit exhibition programs, the BECA Foundation issues no invitations to artists to exhibit their works. Works are submitted via an open call and reviewed without regard to who an artist or designer knows, their resume (or lack thereof of one) or where they come from. This enables artists + designers who are at least 18 years of age to be proactive about pursuing those BECA submission opportunities which resonate most closely with their current art + design practices while it guarantees review of their work by a rotating group of arts professionals. BECA is one of the few arts organizations among contemporary art organizations and institutions which works on such an international scope while exercising an open and inclusive policy when considering work for upcoming exhibitions. The BECA open-submissions policy provides an alternative for artists + designers, no matter where they are located in the world, to their waiting to being invited to have their work exhibited. BECA may be the only arts organization in the world which consistently opens up its blind jury/curatorial review opportunities to all creative producers equally.

BECA is an acronym for Bridge for Emerging Contemporary Art and holds the belief that "New Art + New Design fuels the best of what's yet to come on this planet". BECA serves as a bridge by which new ideas and new art + new design flow freely and develop between local, national and international contemporary art + design communities. It supports innovation, exploration and the advancement of new ideas in contemporary art + design. The core program focus is on developing public exhibition and related opportunities for emerging and under-recognized visual artists + designers. Many emerging artists will argue that although there are many exhibition opportunities for contemporary artists, the pool of opportunities dedicated to emerging art + design is just too small. Thus, both the public and the artists miss valuable opportunities to engage in dialogue with one another while global society in general loses out on the enrichment and advancement that a broader expanse of emerging contemporary art + design offers. BECA opportunities are also extended to established visual artists + designers who are forging new pathways by exploring new mediums, ideas and processes not previously associated with their work.

By presenting new artistic visions from around the world within the public realm via both physical and online venues, BECA exposes a very large and diverse range of participants to emerging contemporary art and culture. BECA exhibitions and related programming engage and educate both new and established audiences while encouraging ongoing dialogue.

Current programming is supported by volunteers (we need you - contact us!), sponsorships and tax-deductible donations. The BECA Foundation is currently operating under 501-c-3 fiscal sponsorship from arts service organization, Fractured Atlas. Through the great folks at Fractured Atlas, The BECA Foundation is able to accept both monetary and in-kind tax-deductible donations. If you would like to make an online tax-deductible contribution in support BECA Foundation programming, you may do so here. If you would like to contact The BECA Foundation, please click here to send an email. Current exhibitions and programming archives may be viewed at: www.becaicad.org/exhibitions.php and www.CurateThis.org and www.BECAgallery.com

History:

The BECA Foundation evolved in 2008 when artists, designers and then BECA gallery Directors, Melissa Roberts and Kurt Schlough, began to see firsthand that their gallery program was far too small to address the broader needs of emerging artists and designers.

For the past 3 years, BECA: Bridge for Emerging Contemporary Art has been developing opportunities for both emerging creative producers as well as the participating public via both physical and online formats. BECA has grown an initial network of a couple of hundred people into network that now encompasses an estimated 32,000 members of the local, national and international art + design communities.

The basic formula has been kept simple...emerging creative producers and the public tell the BECA Foundation what they want in terms of benefits, opportunities and programming, BECA directors listen and then do their best to deliver. The BECA Foundation serves in this capacity because according to BECA directors, each time a talented artist or other creative producer gets shut out of the traditional art world party, we, as a society, lose out. “Our collective futures suffer when emerging talent gives up due to the lack of perceived value and adequate support and opportunities not provided to them along the way. BECA has a mission to plug the holes and fill the gaps in the sometimes archaic art world and other similar systems and deliver opportunities to emerging creative producers that support progress, possibility and innovation toward a tolerant, healthy, just and sustainable future for all. We do not have all of the answers and probably never will. We attempt to provide a few alternatives and we’ve enjoyed promising results thus far.”

Driven by their core belief that 'New Art + New Design Fuels the Best of What's Yet to Come on This Planet', they've taken stock in what they've learned over the past recent years and are creating a finely tuned long term plan for BECA international public arts programming. The daily feedback they receive from artists + designers and the public who are engaged in BECA programming (along with short-term and long-term professional advisors) has been, and will continue to be, invaluable to their organization.

Even though at some points over the past 3 years the BECA open experiment seemed counter-intuitive to how many planned arts programming achieves success, it has been a necessary prelude for the next steps in this project. “We’ve had to allow for mistakes to be made, lessons to be learned and research to be conducted. BECA, as it is today, was not planned to be what is has become nor did we consciously plan to invest 3 years of our lives as non-paid volunteer directors. Sometimes the most important things in life are much larger than the self and these dictate what transpires in our personal lives. If we are lucky, we listen and then get down to the business at hand.”

About BECA Foundation Co-Founders/Directors:

Melissa Roberts and Kurt Schlough have partnered their diverse backgrounds as artists, designers and former gallerists to create several diverse arts related projects, including The BECA Foundation where they both currently serve as volunteer Directors. Kurt Schlough has been a nationally exhibiting sculptor and painter for 15 years while he simultaneously served as the Senior Vice President of Design and lead project manager at an award-winning New Orleans architectural firm. Melissa Roberts is both an artist and activist with an academic background in fine arts, design, biology and communications who creates a diverse range of works including sculpture, site-specific installations, textiles, and digital/multimedia art + design. She also has a professional design background in graphic arts and textile design and has exhibited her works both nationally and internationally. Roberts has over 15 years of experience in project management and administration.

Most recently Roberts and Schlough have together experienced a life changing event when they answered their first ever call to help rescue (and subsequently foster) a dog and her 10 pups from abuse, abandonment and euthanasia. As a result they are now adding a new initiative to BECA programming: ART + ANIMALS.