Day of Remembrance Road Concert: DTLA Spring and Main Loop

 

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

 

Los Angeles Road Concerts is seeking artists of all kinds to install or perform site-specific works in unused public space in Downtown Los Angeles along a loop made of 1st, Spring, 9th and Main St. as part of World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims, Sunday, November 20, 2016.

Submissions may be sent through the online form or to [email protected].

 

In four previous events, LA Road Concerts has shown work from over 250 Los Angeles artists in unused public outdoor space. In a “road concert” participating artists display installations, perform works, facilitate carpool happenings, host spontaneous readings, and make music in unexpected spaces, such as on the sidewalk, between dumpsters, along streetlamps, as well as inside the audience’s earbuds as they traverse the path of the road concert. Audience members can walk, bike, skateboard, carpool or take public transit. They can time it to see it all, go it unplanned, or carefully curate their day.

 

LA Road Concerts seeks to investigate the possibilities of LA's streets as sites for artistic exploration while offering a street-level window onto the city's diversity of people, buildings and landscapes, how the metropolis grew and cars came to dominate, and the in-between and negative spaces the city left behind as it expanded. Through a wide open call process, LA Road Concerts brings together art school graduates, working artists, local residents and other artists, writers, musicians, performers, to realize a broad array of kinds of interactions with the sites. 

 

This particular road concert is part of the annual World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims (http://worlddayofremembrance.org), commemorating the many millions killed and injured on the world’s roads, together with their families and communities. For pedestrians, DTLA is the most dangerous area of the most dangerous US city. Over 600 people on foot were hit by cars in DTLA over 12 years, averaging a person a week. This road concert asks participating artists of any medium to make works that bring awareness to traffic casualties, ponder solutions and utopias, remember the victims, investigate car culture, and explore the complexity of the problem, such as what causes people to make dangerous decisions like texting or drinking while driving, or how our transit systems reflect America's race and class inequalities and privilege the able bodied.

The Day of Remembrance Road Concert loop traverses DTLA’s Historic Core, moving southwesterly along Spring and northeasterly along Main, passing LAPD Headquarters, the LA Times Building, $9 flat rate public parking lots, the Hotel Cecil, City Hall, and other landmarks. Works can be in one location, many locations, or no location in particular. Participating artists don't need to be physically present and may choose to make downloadable work.

 

The preferred deadline for submissions is November 1st, though submissions will be accepted until a week before the event.

 

An official map of the day’s events along with project descriptions and other downloadable information will be available to the public a week before the event on the event website (www.laroadconcerts.com). Previous road concert projects can be viewed through the website. (site relaunch: TBD)

 

Please contact us with any proposals, questions, or suggestions at [email protected]. Or feel free to call or text Stephen van Dyck at 505-331-9588 to discuss your potential submission.