BIPOC + Queer Publishing Fund

CYCLE 1 WINNERS HAVE BEEN CHOSEN FOR 2022/2023

MARIAH GREEN | THE DEEP CUT

ZAIN CURTIS | SENSITIVE CONTENT VOL.1

TAYLOR COLLINS | OH NO-UR OBSESSED!

COLLRANE MERGENS | APOCALYTIC THEATRE

Curious Publishing’s BIPOC & Queer Publishing Fund Cycle 2

Proposals for books publishing in 2024/2025 are open.

Hello!

Thank you for your interest in pitching your project to the team at Curious Publishing. We're excited to hear all about your print project, and the impact it will have an underrepresented communities. Please get comfy and have all of your project information ready before starting. To apply, click the link below.

Since 2018, Curious Publishing has successfully completed a variety of multimedia art projects including: publishing artbooks, zines, and chapbooks, art print collections, merchandise, and exhibition opportunities for over 25 BIPOC and Queer identifying artists residing throughout the Southern California. Through this impact grant, Curious Publishing will have the ability to increase our reach and maximize the visibility of Black, Indigenous, People of Color, and Queer identifying artists who reside throughout the Inland Empire, High Desert Communities and Los Angeles through the art of print. 

Curious Publishing, by default, acts as a cultural hub and zeitgeist.Through our publication services and by producing artist-led community arts and culture festivals, we are determined to continue the growth of the artistic movement we inspire. Curious Publishing empowers the upcoming generation of Inland Empire residents and does so by relentlessly creating a space and platform of lifelong artistic growth. We are committed to providing an accessible and material means of pipelining the novice into career artists and fostering an ever-evolving grassroots movement of arts-based social discourse. 

Through the BIPOC and Queer Publishing Fund, Curious Publishing will create 10 opportunities for artists residing in Southern California, the opportunity to imagine, curate, and actualize their art print project with the assistance of our expert team of designers, artists, curators, and mentors. The goal for this project is for each of the 10 artists to share the stories of marginalized voices through multimedia art projects with an emphasis on applying various print techniques including, but not limited to: Cyanotype, Risograph, Linoleum Block, Monograph, Giclee, Etching, and Letterpress. These bodies of work will be showcased in various settings including traditional museum and gallery settings, as well as through temporary public facing installations and will be accompanied by artist lead discussions on the topics of social justice, environmental racism, racial equity, LGBTQIA+ rights, Black, Indigenous, and People of Color, neurodivergence, and mental health. 

Applications will open on September 1, 2022 to all residents of Southern California. Applicants must submit a personal statement detailing artistic vision, project impact, and social context. Recipients of the fund are required to identify as BIPOC, Queer or neurodivergent. Projects which meet each criteria will begin production in Winter of 2022, and future projects will be chosen through Winter of 2023. A jury of community art leaders will be appointed to vet each proposal before any winners are chosen. Upon awarding the BIPOC + Queer Publishing Fund to an artist, Curious Publishing will select curators, print professionals, and community collaborators to take the artist project from concept to physical reality. Outcomes of this project include development of project management skills, professional writing and editing mentorship, printmaking skill development, event coordination and planning, and additional professional development skills specific to the field of visual arts. The impact of this project will be illustrated through the amplification of marginalized voices paired with the professional platform Curious Publishing has established. The arts must be reclaimed from the exclusivist vanity of the privileged to the hands that built our very culture. 

Project Topics: Cultural & Social Justice, Race & Equity 

Community Engagement & Social Impact:

These projects tell the stories of the rich diaspora of artists residing throughout Greater Southern California, especially in the Inland Empire, a region with a dense BIPOC population that is often overlooked in the art community. When the global pandemic gave way to shelter-in-place lockdowns in 2020, an historically oppressed population has now been further quieted by lacking access to in-person art events; which were once a flourishing source of artistic networking, income opportunities, collaboration, community growth, and creative self-actualization. 

As state-wide pandemic safety restrictions are gradually beginning to recede, our goal of publishing works from marginalized artists is the key step in re-establishing thoughtfully curated in-person art projects for the community to its original capacity and beyond. The pretense of physical media to prelude in-person art events, exhibitions, and workshops is crucial. Despite the apparent return of in-person events becoming more and more socially acceptable and agreeable, some artists may have reservations or physical and economic limitations in doing so. This could be due to health-related limitations such as immunocompromised status, or lack of free time due to employment status and the current inflation of the costs of living in Southern California. 

The BIPOC and Queer Publishing Fund aims to take back the economic capacity for marginalized artists to immerse themselves in projects which celebrate, uplift, and teach the community about diverse backgrounds and histories of oppressed people through multi-media print projects by allowing these project leaders to earn a wage from their art practices. Re-establishing financial independence is crucial in further nurturing a growing community which is currently at the risk of being further oppressed by political, economic, and sociological barriers which stifle creativity. 

The pandemic is a traumatic, multi-generational defining experience in which hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost. Within the first few weeks of sheltering-in-place, it had become all-too-apparent that people turned to consuming and creating art in absence of their everyday lives. This was prevalent in that the sentiment itself of art providing solace became a rallying cry of the under-appreciated and unrecognized work of creative professionals. While such recognition was validating for some of the creative industries, the independent practicing artists were offered little solace outside of camaraderie between fellow creatives which were already established within their community network. 

In order for artistic growth to occur, the burden of loss and the lack of access must be addressed. Without artistic growth, an entire generation of artists risk the opportunity to share stories through their unique, unfiltered, and honest perspective. This project not only ensures that these voices continue to be heard, but that these artists' work will be elevated to a level which can be shared across communities of all socioeconomic levels with diverse backgrounds. 

Community Voice:

The Curious Publishing team acts as a creative revolving door of volunteer, freelance, and short-term contracted contributors and collaborators. This preferred means of collaboration allows us to regularly bring in new ideas and perspectives, which creates an evermore-inclusive dialogue and advances the cultural conversation as much as the artistic movement. By electing members of the artistic community which reside throughout the Inland Empire and Greater Los Angeles, we ensure that the projects develop maintain an accurate reflection of the marginalized voices we aim to amplify. 

The BIPOC and Queer Publishing fund will seek out a diverse advisory committee to review and select artistic print projects to be developed between 2022 and 2023. Curious Publishing will seek out BIPOC, Queer, and Neurodivergent art professionals to assist in the successful execution of the multi-media print projects which will be created under this initative. Completed proposals of this creative initiative will become a composite of marginalized members of society expressed through artistic print projects. 

Upon submission of project proposals, our advisory committee will review the required personal statements of each applicant in which we ask them to: describe their artistic vision, describe their projected social impact, and identify themselves as BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and/or Neurodivergent. When projects are chosen, the Curious Publishing curatorial team will assess the scope of work on the print project, and connect each artist with art professionals which will assist in developing each aspect of the art proposal. Through this process, artists will receive mentorship and peer review provided by Curious Publishing. Project presentations will be showcased in independently owned small art businesses in order to further amplify marginalized communities, as well as presented to higher establishments such as Museums and Universities to amplify and celebrate marginalized voices where they are rarely heard. 

As a non-profit and functionally volunteer-run organization, community engagement is what fuels the success of our mission. The measured growth that we've seen as we approach our fourth year of operation is owed entirely to connecting with individuals, their identities, and their communities. By offering open submission calls for project proposals under the BIPOC and Queer Publishing Fund, we create equitable access for exploring thought-provoking, and socially-conscious themes in which artists share their perspectives, truths, and creative talents. 

To ensure the integrity of this project, Curious Publishing will elect guest curators to assist in the successful planning and execution of the 10 selected projects. Once projects have been successfully developed, the community will have the opportunity to interact with the creatives behind the projects. Curious Publishing will submit a press release to local media to ensure heightened visibility of this initiative which will further document the historic impact of this project. Public exhibitions, artist lead lectures, and workshops surrounding the themes of these projects will give public access to further learning opportunities which impact community members of all ages and backgrounds. 

Through the art of print, we not only create a physical legacy of marginalized artists, we create a new standard for previously marginalized artists to continue to elevate and archive their work while receiving the support and mentorship of their predecessors. 

Population Served:

“Veterans”: defined as an individual who has previously served in the United States military, or an individual who has previously served in a similar military capacity alongside and/or at the request, direction, and command of U.S. military forces 

Arab, MENASA (Middle Eastern, North African, South Asian), Asian, Black, African American, California Native American, Indigenous, Tribal, Disabled, Latinx, Chicanx, LGBTQIA+, Low Income, Neuro-Divergent, People of Color, Students of Color, Trans, Non-Binary People, Immigrants (Documented and/or Undocumented), Refugees, Asylum Seekers, Migrants, Youth (0-24) 

Local Artists:

Local artists have the opportunity to act as collaborative designers, editors, print professionals, and mentors of selected projects in the BIPOC and Queer Publishing Fund. Artists may also nominate artists within their network for consideration of grant funds to produce their print project with Curious Publishing. Come time of 

submissions, art community members will act as a panelist for evaluation projects, and selecting recipients of the BIPOC Publishing project funds. Community members will be invited to share stories in the form of panelists for talks, artist lead workshops, and mentors to add programming to the print projects. 

Project Director:

Rebecca Ustrell (she/her) is the Director of Curious Publishing and is a visual artist working at the community level through several art initiatives in the Inland Empire. Born and raised in San Bernardino County (the largest county in the Inland Empire), she acted as pop-up gallery coordinator of Claremont Art Walk 2015-2017 and Ontario Art Walk 2019-present where she managed large-scale curated vendor events. In her role as Events and Engagement Coordinator for The Arts Area, she maintains an online art events calendar highlighting the Inland Empire, as well as developed a site map for Ontario Art Walk (the first of its kind) which now acts as a guide for the Downtown Ontario Arts District. As project director of Curious Publishing since 2018, she has collaborated with 25 artists to develop small-run independent art projects with highlight the rich diaspora of BIPOC, Womxn, and Queer artists first and foremost. Through this experience, she has the unique perspective of up and coming artists who are native to the Inland Empire who have told their stories through multi-media art forms. What makes the Curious Publishing initiative unique is that the project aims to publish Inland Empire, Womxn, Queer, and BIPOC artists before considering artists from any other background. Through this platform they specifically elevate voices that are often overlooked and undervalued. This creates a space for marginalized artists to thrive and maintain creative autonomy while expressing themselves through the printed medium. As a Latinx, Womxn, Jewish multi-disciplinary artist, Rebecca Ustrell embodies the diverse nature of artists in this region of Southern California. 

Project Support

The BIPOC + Queer Publishing Fund is made possible in part by grant funds from the California Arts Council Impact Grant, The Arts Area and the Inland Empire Community Foundation (IECF), + individual community member support. Make a contribution to sustain the BIPOC + Queer Publishing Fund here.

Curious Publishing is a comprehensive fiscal sponsored project of The Arts Area, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt charitable corporation, EIN 81-3551663.