The Employee by joshua schwebel
About this project

Invitation: "The Employee"

Lauren Wetmore <████████████████████████████████ > To: Eunice Bélidor <██████████████████> Cc: Josh Schwebel <privatejosh@gmail.com>

Dear eunice,

I'm excited to invite you to contribute a text to a publication I am co-editing with Joshua Schwebel  about the emotional, political and financial matrix surrounding labour and funding in the arts, through the lens of Schwebel's project The Employee.

The book will be a collection of essays published in 2023 by Art Metrolpole and Forest City Gallery with contributions by Mariane Bourcheix-Laporte, Teresa Carlesimo, Bopha Chhay, Dana Kopel, Michelle Lacombe, █████████ █████ and Marina Vishmidt (Josh and myself will also contribute texts).

Many of the contributors to the project are addressing the project from theoretical-critical perspectives, but we are also committed to including the perspectives of those with professional and lived experience in the artist-run and not-for-profit cultural sector in Canada.

We feel that your voice would be an essential contribution to a publication reflecting on the complexities of publicly-funded cultural labour and the disintegration of boundaries expressive of neoliberal austerity politics and Fluxus-like mergers between art and life.

Specifically, we imagine that your text could stem from your time at Articule and FOFA gallery (as well as the MMFA, if you felt it was relevant), reflecting on labour culture and the influence of funding bodies on programming and strategy. That said, we are open to thinking with you about what kind of text would be most interesting to contribute.

Ideally, your contribution would be around 2500-3000 words and we can offer you a fee of $600 with a deadline of mid-May 2023. Josh and I would be happy to share already-complete texts with you for reference, as well as to meet over zoom to tell you more about the project.

Thank you for taking the time to consider this proposal, eunice, it would be a dream to include you as a contributor! Let me know if you would like to set up a call to chat more.

Sincerely,

Lauren

laurenwetmore.com

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Lauren Wetmore <████████████████████████████████ > To: Eunice Bélidor <██████████████████> Cc: Josh Schwebel <privatejosh@gmail.com>

Hi eunice,

Please forgive this chasing email. I’m just checking in quickly to make sure that you safely received my emails.

With warm wishes,

Lauren


eunice bélidor <██████████████████ > To: Lauren Wetmore <████████████████████████████████ > Cc: Josh Schwebel <privatejosh@gmail.com>

Hello Lauren,
Thank you so much for considering me for this project, as artist-run centres provide a great breath of such experience!
Before I say yes, I currently do not have the time/financial capacity to write such a lengthy essay for the fee provided, with a quick turnover. As you may know, writing these texts is my livelihood and I have to be mindful of the amount of work versus its pay, as I am sure this project is touching upon at great length. I could write a shorter one of 600-800 words, which averages the amount I am paid for my writing. If after reading this you still consider my participation I would be happy to meet via zoom to discuss this further.
All the best,
eunice
eunice bélidor
.。*+.*.。(❁´◡`❁).。*+.*.。
commissaire|curator