EXHIBITION | CALL TO ARTISTS | ARTICLE

First Fifty
Show us what you've got!

The art exhibition is a relatively modern phenomenon. For thousands of years art was made without the need to put it on a wall for the general public to view. Things changed in 1673, when the Académie des beaux-arts in Paris put art on the walls of Salon Carré, a modest room in the Louvre that now shows 12-15th century Italian paintings. These early exhibitions allowed young artists, mostly from the École des beaux-arts, to show their work, get critical feedback, and make a name for themselves. Because these exhibitions were juried, they were often controversial. For nearly two centuries after their creation, inclusion in the Académie’s exhibition was necessary for an artist to have a career. Who was included and who was excluded defined the history of art as we know it today.

An exhibition is an experience like no other. To exhibit one’s art is to declare oneself an artist and to ask to be seen and treated as one. An artist’s exhibition history defines their worth. But on a more basic level, the experience of seeing something one made hanging on the wall of a gallery is simply exhilarating: the completion of months, sometimes years, of sweat, labor, and struggle; the moment of truth when one discovers how their work influences other people.

Few artists have the opportunity to exhibit their work. During any one month, there are fifty or so venues to exhibit at in the City of Burlington, but literally hundreds more artists than that. Most venues are governed by curators who determine who will be exhibited based largely on a personal aesthetic and understanding of art. For five years, Burlington City Arts held an annual Firehouse Open at the Firehouse Gallery on Church Street that reversed this fact by allowing the first fifty artists who walked through the door to put their art on the walls of the gallery. The annual event was a truly democratic exhibition of the people. Burlington City Arts discontinued the program in 2005. In 2007, Art Map Burlington picked up the program and held that year's edition was held at Kasini House.

2008
Art's Alive and Art Map Burlington invite artists to participate in this local tradition. We feel it is an opportunity for us to be exposed to local talent that has yet to appear on the radar and it is an opportunity for artists to show and introduce their work to the public. The 2008 edition of First Fifty will be held at Art's Alive Gallery at Union Station February 1st to 29th. We invite you to the opening on Friday, February 1st, 5-8PM, during the First Friday Art Walk.