DETAILS:

This program is open to Minnesota-based, BIPOC artists or creative collectives who create from / within / across / through multiple mediums, genres and disciplines. This is broad, expansive, and self-defined. This is an opportunity for artists who cultivate live performance as part of their creative practice.

1. This is a modest offering over a period of two years.

2. Over the program period, October 2024-October 2026, two artists or collectives will each be offered: 

1. 50 total hours of process-oriented space at Red Eye (25 hours per year)

2. A total of $4000 (disbursed $2000 per year)

3. 40 hours of administrative support and 20 hours of artistic support from Red Eye’s Co-Artistic Directors, over the two-year period. This may include dramaturgical or “outside eye” support, technical support, consultation on marketing, fundraising, producing, etc. 

3. Goals, outcomes, or intentions will be led by / formed by the participating artists. Red Eye will support an agreed-upon structure that the chosen artists propose for this time.

4. Red Eye will leverage its position as a small nonprofit organization to create partnerships that will gather additional resources for the OMNIVERS artists, such as access to tools and equipment, skill sharing, space partnerships, relationship building, etc. This will be driven by the needs and interests of the OMNIVERS artists and the available resources of Red Eye.

5. Currently the program is administered primarily by Valerie Oliveiro and Emily Gastineau, though the artist may exchange with all of Red Eye’s Co-Artistic Directors.

6. This RFP is for the fourth cohort of two artists or collectives. They will overlap with the third cohort of OMNIVERS artists, José A. Luis and Pedra Pepa, for several months, and then overlap with the next cohort of OMNIVERS artists in their second year with Red Eye.

7. This year, we are particularly encouraging collectives to apply, whether established or newly formed.

ABOUT RED EYE THEATER

Red Eye is a collectively organized, artist-led creative incubator for live performance. Known for engaging the full life cycle of artistic work—from early process to public sharing and back again—Red Eye lifts up inter/anti/transdisciplinary forms, works that resist categorization, art that understands itself as a part of a conversation, and creation that challenges dominant culture. The organization offers the resources of a small not-for-profit to walk with artists at many stages of their journey, incubating the radical voices of our fellow artists, in order to imagine how our shared futures might be otherwise.

Led by a collective of working artists, Red Eye values reciprocity, peer-to-peer relationships, and deep, transformative collaboration. These practices extend from the group of Co-Artistic Directors through to our relationships with artists, audiences, and community at many layers of proximity. Red Eye’s community is one that values complexity, exchange, and ongoing curiosity. We find possibility in the periphery and expansiveness through alterity. The organization advocates for equity and resilience, and is invested in walking the long road toward our liberation, particularly with the performance community in the Twin Cities. 

After losing our former space in 2019, Red Eye worked to reestablish our community's artistic home. Since 2022, we have stewarded a performance space located on unceded Dakota land in the Seward neighborhood of Minneapolis. This ~3000 sq ft flexible and accessible space is a home for contemporary performance in the Twin Cities—a place to deepen embodied practice, build networks of mutual support, exchange ideas, and contribute to transformative shifts in culture.

APPLICATION COMPONENTS

1. Basic information: Your name, pronouns, email address, mailing address, phone number

2. Sharing your practice: Materials can be in any formats. You may choose the format and components of your application. Here are some examples (though not an exhaustive list) of materials you may choose to submit: 

   • Video links: performance documentation, improvisation practice, video of you talking about your work

   • Written materials: performance text, process writing, project description, artist statement, scores, lists, references and influences, plans, text you submitted for another application

   • Images: photographs, blueprints, mockups, drawings, research material

   • Sound files: documentation, field recordings, recorded conversation

   • Something else: make us a proposal!

     → You may choose to share materials that illuminate your past work, or give a window into your process as it’s developing into the future.

     → Remember that we will spend 15-20 minutes total reviewing your materials. You may provide cue points for video materials; otherwise we will start at the beginning of the video. If you are submitting multiple pieces, you may indicate an order; otherwise we will go through the materials on our own.

3. Context (optional): Is there anything else you would like us to know about you? Share whatever personal and/or professional context you feel is relevant: worldview, priorities, accomplishments, influences, etc. These materials are optional; you can decide to let the work stand on its own.

How to submit:

Please email the above components to staff@redeyetheater.org by Sunday, September 8, 2024. If your application contains materials that require a mailing address, they can be sent to Red Eye Theater, 2213 Snelling Ave Minneapolis, MN 55404 and must be postmarked by September 8, 2024.

If you have questions about the program or the application process, feel free to reach out to staff@redeyetheater.org or to schedule a phone call.

APPLICATION PROCESS

Formats:

Red Eye invites applicants to share evidence of your artistic work in a format that you feel best reflects the work or yourself/yourselves as an artist or collective, rather than in a format that we design. We will learn about your work via the form you choose to express it. What is the format that will help the reader/viewer/listener understand your work on its own terms? Some application processes indirectly expect vulnerability, past trauma, and oppression to frame parts of an application. We invite you to speak to what would liberate.

Labor and time:

Applications generate too much unpaid labor for artists, so we are offering this parameter to reduce your application-labor. Please spend no more than two hours preparing your application for OMNIVERS, or alternately, spend no more than 20% of the time you would typically spend on an application. We understand that the relationship between work and time differs for everyone, and time is an imperfect metric. We encourage you to value your own time and to use what you already have! Expect for us to take about 15-20 minutes to review your materials. (Exceptions are possible for appropriate materials; please indicate if the format of your work requires additional time and we will be happy to consider.)

SELECTION / MUTUAL CURIOSITIES

Red Eye has resources to support two artists or collectives this year, and we will identify those individuals or groups with these considerations in mind: 

1. There is relative clarity within the application materials around who the artist or collective is as a maker, as well as the types of making they are interested in, what mediums and disciplines come to the forefront in their work (and why), and there is a trajectory of the artist’s or collective’s practice that includes some open questions. 

2. There is evidence in the application materials that the artist or collective engages in performance as at least one of the ways they express themselves. 

3. OMNIVERS is open to BIPOC artists at all career stages. We encourage those who are 2SLGBTQIA+, have disabilities, and/or have other intersecting marginalized identities to apply. IF YOU ARE APPLYING, WE ASSUME YOU ARE ELIGIBLE AND YOU DO NOT HAVE TO PROVE YOUR IDENTITY IN YOUR APPLICATION.

4. Red Eye is looking for artists who can propose a structure that serves their process. OMNIVERS is a flexible container, and we hope the artists in the program will take an active role in shaping it. We recognize that the capacity to identify directions for the process and create your own containers to hold that process requires significant self-knowledge. We learned through the this program that this type of self-knowledge often comes through experience, but we recognize it may arise otherwise, and we wish to detach that capacity from a traditional understanding of career stage. 

5. Red Eye wants to work with artists who are interested to work with us. As a collective of working artists, we strive to create a relationship as peers who are currently in a position to support your work.

TIMELINE

• Program announcement: August 1, 2024

• Info session: Thursday, August 22, 6-7 pm

• This info session will be held virtually. Please email staff@redeyetheater.org to RSVP for the info session, and we will respond with a Zoom link.

• The info session is an opportunity for applicants to talk with Red Eye Co-Artistic Directors, ask questions about the program and the application process. They are a resource for you, but not required to attend.

• Application deadline: Sunday, September 8, 2024

• Conversations between applicants, references, and Red Eye: Late September 2024

• After reviewing applicants’ materials, Red Eye Co-Artistic Directors will contact 5 applicants for further conversation. The interview will be an opportunity to speak to aspects of your work that were not reflected in the initial application materials, ask questions about Red Eye and the program, and talk about potential for collaboration over the project period. 

• For these 5 applicants, we may request 2 references who know your process well (such as a collaborator, mentor, friend). 

• Applicant notification: Early October 2024

• Program timeline: October 15, 2024-October 15, 2026

ACCESSIBILITY

Red Eye is committed to cultivating and promoting an organizational culture of equity, accessibility, and inclusion. We will be happy to provide resources to ensure individuals with disabilities are able to be full participants in OMNIVERS. To discuss participation options for an info session or request application materials in an alternate format, please contact staff@redeyetheater.org or 612.870.7531.

CONTACT

Valerie Oliveiro (he/she/they), Red Eye Co-Artistic Director, valerie@redeyetheater.org

Emily Gastineau (she/her), Red Eye Co-Artistic Director, emily@redeyetheater.org

Reach all of the Co-Artistic Directors at staff@redeyetheater.org or 612.870.7531.