White Elephant – submissions due Nov 20th

[NOTE: Submissions are now closed for this event.]

This December, FICTILIS is organizing an art/craft fair called White Elephant and we need your submissions! Any area artist can apply for a table to sell work during First Thursday Art Walk (Dec 1st) and other dates in December.

Application is free; modest table fee to cover table rental will apply to those accepted.

There are several ways for artists to participate:

• Artists may rent a table (or equivalent space) to display and sell their work during Pioneer Square’s First Thursday Artwalk 5-9pm Thursday December 1st.
• Artists may rent a table to display/sell work on select Saturdays in December.
• Artists may submit work to be displayed as part of the White Elephant exhibition during the month of December.

Work does not need to fit one of our categories, but we hope to be able to organize the exhibition part of White Elephant into the following loosely-themed “departments”:

• Handmade: made by hand, custom-made, DIY, “indie”, homespun, hand-crafted
• Readymade: vintage, found, re-interpreted, re-purposed, re-contextualized, re-gifted
• Un-made: not yet made, disassembled, re-assembled, broken, reverse-engineered, hacked
• Bad: so bad (kitsch, cheap, ugly, creepy, impractical, etc.) it’s good
• Used: aged, worn (out), well-loved, shop-worn, faded, abused, weathered, rusted
• GIFs: GIF animations.

Here’s what Wikipedia has to say on the origin of the term:

A white elephant is an idiom for a valuable but burdensome possession of which its owner cannot dispose and whose cost (particularly cost of upkeep) is out of proportion to its usefulness or worth. The term derives from the story that the kings of Siam (now Thailand) were accustomed to make a present of one of these animals to courtiers who had rendered themselves obnoxious, in order to ruin the recipient by the cost of its maintenance. In modern usage, it is an object, scheme, business venture, facility, etc., considered to be without use or value.

and the gift-giving game named after it:

A white elephant gift exchange is a popular holiday party game found primarily in North America. It has many variations in both the name and the game play…White elephant parties have been known to result in intensely vicious and/or playful rivalries between players trying to get sought after gifts. The goal of a white elephant party is usually to entertain rather than to gain…Gifts are typically inexpensive, humorous items or used items from home.

That being said, please note: applicants do not have to submit work that is bad – on the contrary, work should be bad in a good way, or just plain good.  White Elephant aims to put the bad beside the good in a way that makes them both look better.

Deadline for applications is November 15th extended to November 20th! Applicants will be notified by Nov 22nd of acceptance.