Apply to liberation (n.)(v.) studios, gallery; community-based collaborative practice
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Entry deadlineJan 1, 2029 · 7:59 AM
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Jury notificationJan 2, 2030 · 7:59 AM
Organization:
Liberation(n.)(v.) A Collaborative Practice, Gallery and Studios.
Location
Brentwood, MD
Entry Fee
Free Entry
Deadline
December 31, 2028
Overview
liberation is a cross-disciplinary, community-facing gallery and studio project supporting artists, curators, writers, and culture workers whose practices engagem equity, social imagination, and collective making.
The space operates on a break-even, non-extractive/anti-capitalist model: modest licensing fees for participating artists support access to space, tools, programming, and visibility, while underwriting a larger cultural intervention rooted in care, rigor, and community accountability.
liberation is not a traditional residency or commercial studio. It is a participatory, artist-led environment for people who want to work and think in community.
What We Offer
3–12 month studio associates (visual, culinary, hybrid) with access to:
--Semi-private studio bays (micro, small, medium and double-small/large)
--Access and training to shared tools (wood, metal, 2D/3D, fabrication-friendly)
--Programming: studios visits, talks, collaborative community interventions, and resident artist-led critiques
--Curatorial micro-residencies of 1-6 weeks each.
--Digital residencies available for non-DMV artists.
--Community-responsive programming shaped by residents
--Freight Container Gallery (Launching Summer 2027)
--A converted shipping container serving as the public gallery (TBA)
--Exhibitions, screenings, performances, and pop-ups
--Resident-led shows alongside invited and community projects
--Freight Container Culinary Residency (Launch TBD)
--Short micro-residencies for marginalized chefs and food-based artists (Launch TBD)
--Container-based kitchen for tastings, dinners, and public conversations w/ a focus on food justice, storytelling, and neighborhood engagement (Launch TBD)
Public Programs
--Artist talks, workshops, exhibitions, events, and conversations
--Hybrid programming for in-person and remote audiences
Who This Is For
Liberation is best suited for artists and cultural workers who:
--Value process, critique, and mutual responsibility
--Are interested in equity-centered, socially engaged practice
--Want access to space and dialogue
--Are comfortable working in a shared, evolving environment
liberation is inspired by artist-organizer models (Carol Bebelle, Margaret Boozer, Rick Lowe, Theaster Gates and Amanda Williams) rather than solely market-driven studio rentals.
On Liberation (as Method, Form, and Practice)
Liberation is not named here as an outcome already achieved, nor as a metaphor untethered from material conditions. It is understood instead as a discursive and (political) sculptural maneuver—a set of practices that operate within constraint, rupture, and unfinished struggle.
The project is indebted to Black critical thought, and particularly to the work of Hortense Spillers, whose writing insists that Black cultural production must be read not only for what it represents, but for how it reorganizes grammar, relation, and the terms of legibility itself. Liberation, in this sense, is not additive or corrective; it is recompositional.
Following the insights of Afropessimism, liberation does not presume a stable social ground upon which repair is easily enacted. Instead, it acknowledges the ongoing condition of structural antagonism and the limits of inclusion as a solution. From this position, the work of the space is not optimism, but study.
Study in Community
liberation understands study as an active, collective process: learning together, thinking aloud, arguing carefully, and exteriorizing thought through conversation, making, and critique. This study is:
--In-group and outward-facing
--Multidisciplinary and political
--Situated within real economic conditions
liberation is a cross-disciplinary, community-facing gallery and studio project supporting artists, curators, writers, and culture workers whose practices engagem equity, social imagination, and collective making.
The space operates on a break-even, non-extractive/anti-capitalist model: modest licensing fees for participating artists support access to space, tools, programming, and visibility, while underwriting a larger cultural intervention rooted in care, rigor, and community accountability.
liberation is not a traditional residency or commercial studio. It is a participatory, artist-led environment for people who want to work and think in community.
What We Offer
3–12 month studio associates (visual, culinary, hybrid) with access to:
--Semi-private studio bays (micro, small, medium and double-small/large)
--Access and training to shared tools (wood, metal, 2D/3D, fabrication-friendly)
--Programming: studios visits, talks, collaborative community interventions, and resident artist-led critiques
--Curatorial micro-residencies of 1-6 weeks each.
--Digital residencies available for non-DMV artists.
--Community-responsive programming shaped by residents
--Freight Container Gallery (Launching Summer 2027)
--A converted shipping container serving as the public gallery (TBA)
--Exhibitions, screenings, performances, and pop-ups
--Resident-led shows alongside invited and community projects
--Freight Container Culinary Residency (Launch TBD)
--Short micro-residencies for marginalized chefs and food-based artists (Launch TBD)
--Container-based kitchen for tastings, dinners, and public conversations w/ a focus on food justice, storytelling, and neighborhood engagement (Launch TBD)
Public Programs
--Artist talks, workshops, exhibitions, events, and conversations
--Hybrid programming for in-person and remote audiences
Who This Is For
Liberation is best suited for artists and cultural workers who:
--Value process, critique, and mutual responsibility
--Are interested in equity-centered, socially engaged practice
--Want access to space and dialogue
--Are comfortable working in a shared, evolving environment
liberation is inspired by artist-organizer models (Carol Bebelle, Margaret Boozer, Rick Lowe, Theaster Gates and Amanda Williams) rather than solely market-driven studio rentals.
On Liberation (as Method, Form, and Practice)
Liberation is not named here as an outcome already achieved, nor as a metaphor untethered from material conditions. It is understood instead as a discursive and (political) sculptural maneuver—a set of practices that operate within constraint, rupture, and unfinished struggle.
The project is indebted to Black critical thought, and particularly to the work of Hortense Spillers, whose writing insists that Black cultural production must be read not only for what it represents, but for how it reorganizes grammar, relation, and the terms of legibility itself. Liberation, in this sense, is not additive or corrective; it is recompositional.
Following the insights of Afropessimism, liberation does not presume a stable social ground upon which repair is easily enacted. Instead, it acknowledges the ongoing condition of structural antagonism and the limits of inclusion as a solution. From this position, the work of the space is not optimism, but study.
Study in Community
liberation understands study as an active, collective process: learning together, thinking aloud, arguing carefully, and exteriorizing thought through conversation, making, and critique. This study is:
--In-group and outward-facing
--Multidisciplinary and political
--Situated within real economic conditions