A decade-long initiative culminating in Philagrafika 2010, an international festival on the role of print in contemporary art engaging 92 cultural organizations in Greater Philadelphia.

A decade-long initiative culminating in Philagrafika 2010, an international festival on the role of print in contemporary art engaging 92 cultural organizations across Philadelphia.

Founded in 2000 as the Philadelphia Print Collaborative, Philagrafika grew from a grassroots network into a nationally recognized nonprofit dedicated to promoting printmaking as a vital art form — building critical dialogue, developing new curatorial models, and presenting the medium as an integral component of contemporary practice.

Teresa co-founded Philagrafika with Robert Brand and led the organization for a decade, building its partnerships, programs, and funding base from the ground up. Her work culminated in Philagrafika 2010, an international festival on the role of print in contemporary art, presented January through April 2010 across Philadelphia. The festival engaged 1,056 artists from around the world and 92 cultural organizations through three program tracks: The Graphic Unconscious, Out of Print, and Independent Projects.

The Graphic Unconscious was the festival's core multi-site exhibition, developed through a collaborative curatorial model led by Artistic Director and Chief Curator José Roca. The exhibition brought together artists from 80 countries working across sculpture, performance, video, installation, and diverse approaches to print.

Out of Print took a different approach: five artists were matched with five Philadelphia history museums to conduct original research and create new work and public programming rooted in each institution's collection.

Philagrafika 2010 was supported by the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, the William Penn Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and the Barra Foundation.

Press

Philagrafika 2010 was reviewed in theNew York Times andNPR, and covered in Art in America: "The Open Print: Philadelphia hosts a citywide exhibition that invites artists from around the world to push the definition of what constitutes a print," Faye Hirsch, April 2010, Issue No. 4, pp. 67–74. The festival was also featured inArtNexus, Issue 75, December–February 2010, a Bogotá-based publication dedicated to contemporary art in Latin America and beyond. Additional coverage includes: Schultz, Charles. "A Matrix You Can Move In: Prints and Installation Art." Art in Print, vol. 1, no. 3, 2011, pp. 12–18.

Publication 

The Graphic Unconscious, the festival catalog, includes an essay by Teresa on the history of Philagrafika and the making of the festival. Eds. José Roca and Jennie Hirsch. Philagrafika/Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, 2011.

A program guide and map documenting all participating venues and the full scope of the festival was also produced in conjunction with Philagrafika 2010.

Partners and Curators

The Graphic Unconscious Moore College of Art & Design, Lorie Mertes · Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Julian Robson · Philadelphia Museum of Art, Shelley R. Langdale · The Print Center, John Caperton · Temple Contemporary, Tyler School of Art, Sheryl Conkelton

Out of Print American Philosophical Society · Historical Society of Pennsylvania · Independence Seaport Museum · Rosenbach Museum & Library · University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology

Philagrafika Blog(archived site)

Photos

1. Duke Riley, Aerial Documentation of L.K.L.A. –Occupied Territory on Petty’s Island, 2010. Image: courtesy the artist and Magnan Metz Gallery · 2. Regina Silveira, installation view of Mundus Admirabilis, 2008–2010 · 3. Detail, Rerum Naturae, 2007–2008. Image 2 and 3: courtesy the artist and Luciana Brito Galeria, São Paulo · 4.Installation view of Brand New View, Gunilla Klingberg, 2010 · 5. Detail, Brand New View, shows logos found in Philadelphia supermarkets. Image 4 and 5: courtesy the artist and Galerie Nordenhake · 6. Óscar Muñoz, Narcisos en processo (Narcissi on Process), 2010. Image: courtesy the artist and Sicardi Gallery · 7. Francesc Ruiz, Newsstand (Philadelphia), 2010 · 8. Detail, Newsstand (Philadelphia). Image: courtesy the artist · 9. Swoon (Caledonia Curry), Cairo, Sunday Afternoon, 2009–2010. Image: courtesy the artist · 10. Betsabeé Romero, Always finding another cage, 2010. Image: courtesy the artist · 11. Space 1026, Untitled, 2010. Image: courtesy the artists · 12. · Mike Houston and Martin Mazorra of Cannonball Press, “The Bounding Billow,” a limited edition artist book, 2010. Image: courtesy the artists· 13. Óscar Muñoz, Ante la imagen, (Confronting the Image), 2010, Philagrafika 2010 Signature Edition Series 

Photo credits: Constance Mensh · Rebecca Mott · Caitlin Perkins