BMW Art & Culture is calling for applications for the BMW Residency dedicated to Photography, at GOBELINS, the School of Visual Arts Paris.

Paris. After 6 years of partnership with the
Nicéphore Nièpce Museum, and as the BMW Group just celebrated his 100
years, BMW Group France confirms the new direction of the 2018
Residency through its partnership with GOBELINS, the School of Visual
Arts in Paris, for the second consecutive year.

For this new edition, BMW, which has always fostered a pioneering
spirit, is more than ever putting the emphasis on experimentation.
This is why GOBELINS was a natural choice for BMW; the two companies
sharing the same values of excellence and innovation.

The innovative pedagogy and experiments of the school, the
transmission between experts, laureates and students perfectly reflect
the philosophy expressed by BMW for the years to come. BMW defends the
values of aesthetics and technological innovation. The car brand has
chosen to accompany photography as an original and specific medium, a
founding invention of modernity as well as the automobile. BMW
expresses its support for photography around an unprecedented and
ambitious cultural partnership initiated in 2011. Unprecedented,
because it tends to propose new keys of understanding the interaction
between art and technology and their impact on man and society.
Ambitious, because it favors artistic and technological
experimentations and innovations.

The call for applications for the next BMW Residency
is available on BMW and GOBELINS websites.

The projects presented by the applicants for the BMW
Residency will have to focus on innovation and experimentation to
offer a fresh vision of our world in motion, by all means: technical,
narrative, documentary, humorous…

 

The Artistic Director’s contribution

François Cheval will be the artistic director for the BMW Residency
at GOBELINS.

He will be involved in the preselection of applications and will
submit this selection to the Jury. He will support the laureate in
his/her researches and artistic project, handle the production, curate
the exhibitions and write the presentation texts. Communication et
relations publiques

 

The BMW support for the Residency

Funding and resources

– The artist will receive a grant of 6,000€ and accommodation in
Paris, if necessary for the three months in Residency at Gobelins.
This support will freed him/her of any material constraints throughout
the Residency period to be able to concentrate on the photographic
project with the support of the School, the advice of the artistic
director and BMW support.

– A selection of images produced during the Residency will be
exhibited at the Rencontres de la Photographie in Arles and at the
Paris Photo Fair. BMW is partnering both of these major events, for 9
years and 15 years respectively.

– The work produced in Residency will be published in a book with
éditions Trocadéro.

– The works produced during the BMW Residency, signed and serially
numbered, will be divided into three batches:

o The first batch will be exhibited and then returned to the artist.

o The second batch will be made up of two images for GOBELINS,
including one chosen for communication purposes.

o The third batch, a selection of works chosen jointly by the artist
and BMW France, will go to BMW France in exchange for its patronage.

 

The BMW Residency at GOBELINS

The BMW Residency is remaining true to its fundamental principle:
continuous support for the winner, from the creation and production of
works to the edition of a book published by éditions Trocadéro.

To these guiding principles is added the residency’s team
contribution that puts all its expertise behind this photographic
project, creating interactions between the winner, and the GOBELINS
educational staff and students.

A third-year student will act as photographic assistant to the
winner. This will be a very rewarding experience for the student. The
student will work alongside the artist, and benefit from the advice of
François Cheval, the artistic director of the Residency.

GOBELINS will also provide a photography team of students, who will
contribute to promote the BMW Residency on the social networks,
through arranging meetings as well as producing photos and videos.
This team will foster interactions with the school’s other students in
conjunction with BMW, the winner and GOBELINS.

Applications files must be composed of a biography, a
file presenting the general approach of the artist, a series of
completed works as well as a note of intent on the artistic project.
Ten photographers will be selected in a preselection.

They will be asked to make themselves available for half a day for an
interview with the jury and present photographic prints and work done.

The files will be transmitted digitally:
candidatures.residencebmw@gobelins.fr until April 4th, 2018.

The jury will meet in May for an announcement of the winner in June.
Shooting should be done by the end of December, and production before
March 1st, 2019.

The call for applications and the rules and regulations can be
downloaded
from the websites:

BMW Group France: www.bmw.com/ResidenceBMW

GOBELINS, the school of image: www.gobelins.fr/bmw-Residence2018
Communication et relations publiques

 

The first six winners

The BMW Residency has drawn the work of the first winners to the
attention of photography professionals as well as making it known to
the wider public.

In 2011, Alexandra Catière was
the first year’s winner. This young artist from Belarus stood out for
her sensitvity, for her intelligence, and for her works blending
together both classical and avant-garde techniques.

Book co-produced by BMW Art Culture and éditions Trocadéro. BMW
Residency Collection, Alexandra Catiere 2011.

In 2012, BMW supported Marion
Gronier
, a young French photographer, in her personal
endeavours on the human figure and its various masks. Her photography
captures the moment when the form of the mask breaks down, or when the
face, disembodied, empties.

Book co-produced by BMW Art Culture and éditions Trocadéro. BMW
Residency Collection, Marion Gronier 2012.

In 2013, the duo Mazaccio
Drowilal
, attracted a very wide audience with the “Wild
Style” project, questioning the imagery of wildness in mass culture.

Book co-produced by BMW Art Culture and éditions Trocadéro. BMW
Residency Collection, Mazaccio Drowilal 2013.

In 2014, Natasha Caruana, a young
British artist, devoted her time in the Residency in seeking the truth
of “love at first sight”. She took her inspiration from her
own life and drew on popular myths and scientific surveys to get
closer, through photography, to the truth of this phenomenon that will
always be inexplicable.

Book co-produced by BMW Art Culture and éditions Trocadéro. BMW
Residency Collection, Natasha Caruana 2014.

In 2015, Alinka Echeverría, with
her “Fieldnotes for Nicephora” project, examined the
historic, technical and philosophic links between photography and
ceramics. Her project took us into the museum’s archives.

Book co-produced by BMW Art Culture and éditions Trocadéro. BMW
Residency Collection, Alinka Echeverria 2015.

In 2016, Dune Varela, in
“Always the sun” project for the BMW Residence questioned
the different forms of photographic representation through various
temporalities. She reflects on the alteration and fragility of
photography as a medium, and the integration into the image produced
by the process of disappearance.

Book co-published by BMW Art Culture and Trocadéro editions.
BMW Residence Collection, Dune Varela 2017.

In 2017, Baptiste Rabichon
currently in residency at Gobelins, School of Visual Arts

 

BMW France and Photography

Dare to create, dare to innovate has always been in the genes of BMW.
Since 2003, BMW France has supported photography, consistent with its
core business of innovation, aesthetics and driving pleasure. This
commitment first came to fruition alongside Paris Photo in the BMW –
Paris Photo Award. Awarded for 8 years, this prize has become an
international reference taking pride in the work of artists presented
by galleries and contributing to the renewal of the photographic
language. BMW has been a partner of Paris Photo since then and has
today become an official partner. It continued with the Rencontres
d’Arles, of which BMW has been a partner for nine years. This
commitment was reinforced in 2011, with the setting up of the BMW
Residency. Communication et relations publiques

 

BMW Group sponsors arts

BMW supports more than 100 cultural projects worldwide, in modern and
contemporary art, jazz and classical music, as well as in architecture
and design, thus contributing to the dissemination of knowledge and
the arts. In each of its partnerships, BMW Group guarantees artists
absolute freedom, as it is as essential to the success of innovative
artistic work as to the emergence of major innovations in a successful
company. The story began in 1972, when three very large paintings
“Rot”, “Gelb” and “Blau” were ordered to
the artist Gerhard Richter for the headquarters of the BMW Group in
Munich. During this period, BMW introduced with Hervé Poulain the
collection of BMW Art Cars, made by modern and contemporary artists of
international renown, such as Alexander Calder, Roy Lichtenstein, Andy
Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg, Olafur Eliasson or Jeff Koons. At the end
of 2016, John Baldessari’s 19th BMW Art Car was presented at Art Basel
Miami Beach and placed 8th in the GTLM classification at the 24 Hours
of Daytona (USA). In 2017, the BMW Art Car, directed by Chinese
multimedia artist Cao Fei, was shown in Beijing and raced in November
at the 24 Hours of Macao. BMW supports museums and awards, such as the
Munich Academy of Fine Arts, the Goethe-Institut, the “Premio de
Pintura” in Spain, the Berlin Biennial, the Tate Modern in
London, where BMW has created the “BMW Tate Live” “. In
addition, partnerships with international fairs have intensified in
recent years: alongside the abc (Berlin art contemporary), Gallery
Weekend Berlin and the Berlin Biennial, BMW cooperates, for example,
with Art Basel in Basel , Miami Beach and Hong Kong, Frieze Art Fair
and the Frieze Masters in London and New York, Paris Photo,
Kyotography, the Korea International Art Fair and the Kochi-Muziris
Biennale in India. Since 2015, Art Basel and BMW have been supporting
emerging artists through the BMW Art Journey, which allows the
laureate to make a journey of discovery and creation. Finally, the 4th
edition of the “BMW Art Guide by Independent Collectors” was
published in autumn 2016. 256 private collector’s presentations take
the reader on a journey around more than 43 countries, often in
unusual regions.

 

GOBELINS, School of Visual Arts

As a member body of the Paris Region Chamber of Commerce and
Industry, GOBELINS trains almost 800 students every year, 400 of them
on apprenticeship contracts. The school also provides continuous
training in photography, print and multimedia communication, graphic
design, interactive design, animation and video game design for 1,900
trainees every year.

The school has gained national and international recognition. For the
second year in a row, GOBELINS was ranked as the world’s top school
for animation (Animation career review, January 2017), top school for
graphic design and top apprenticeship training centre in France in the
graphical industries. GOBELINS is a pioneering provider of training in
digital and interactive communication. It trains creative technology
students with a comprehensive knowledge of design and user experience.

www.gobelins.fr

 

BMW Group in France

BMW Group has four locations in France: Montigny-le-Bretonneux (head
office), Tigery (training center), Strasbourg (international PRA
center) and Miramas (international technical test center). The BMW
Group employs more than 5,000 employees in France with its commercial
and financial subsidiaries as well as its exclusive distribution
network. In 2017, BMW Group France registered 87,748 cars of the BMW
and MINI brands and 16020 motorcycles and scooters of the BMW Motorrad
brand. The annual volume of BMW Group purchases from French equipment
manufacturers and suppliers amounts to billions of Euro. Among them
are Dassault Systèmes, Faurecia, Michelin, Plastic Omnium, St Gobain
and Valeo. The cooperation with PSA on 1.6-liter engines is a great
success. As part of its electro-mobility strategy, BMW Group created
the BMW i brand and introduced the revolutionary BMW i3 and BMW i8.
BMW Group France also pursues an active and permanent sponsorship
policy with renowned cultural actors such as the Rencontres de la
Photographie, Arles, Paris Photo and Gobelins, the school of visual
Art where the BMW Residence is held for photography emerging. For more
than 30 years, BMW Group France has been financing public utility
projects through its Foundation under the auspices of the Fondation de
France: currently road safety for young drivers. The social commitment
of the BMW Group also comes with its partnerships in the French sport:
French Golf Federation (FFG), and the French Rugby Federation (FFR)
and the XV of France. www.bmw.fr
Facebook: facebook.com/BMWFrance Twitter: twitter.com/BMWFrance
Instagram: instagram.com/BMWFrance/ YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/BMWFrance
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/bmw-group-france?trk=top_nav_home

 

BMW Group

BMW Group, which includes the BMW, MINI, Rolls-Royce and BMW Motorrad
brands, is the world’s leading manufacturer of premium automobiles and
motorcycles, also providing services in the areas of finance and
mobility. A global company, BMW Group operates 31 production and
assembly sites in 14 countries, as well as a sales network in more
than 140 countries. For the 2017 fiscal year, BMW Group’s worldwide
sales reached a total of 2,463,500 cars and more than 164,000
motorcycles. In 2016, the company achieved a pre-tax profit of 9.67
billion euros for a turnover of approximately 94.16 billion euros. At
December 31, 2016, the BMW Group had 124,729 employees. The success of
the BMW Group has always been one of responsible, long-term action.
Throughout the value creation chain, the company’s development
strategy is based on ecological and social sustainability, the
manufacturer’s full responsibility for its products and a firm
commitment to preserving the company’s values and natural resources.
www.bmwgroup.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/BMWGroup
Twitter: http://twitter.com/BMWGroup