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Callithump! now seeking Collaborators, Sponsors and Hosts

From the very start, one of our missions was to provide new ways for promoting and interacting with the arts. Now we want to take that further. It’s time to take this show on the road and we don’t want to travel alone.

Currently we have three 2″ capsule vending machines. These will be deployed in three different locations. The contents of each machine will be an encapsulated gallery show, featuring the work of a single artist, group or theme. The galleries will rotate from location to location, changing every month. We’ll add a new exhibit every month and retire it after it has shown in all locations.

Participating artists will either keep the proceeds or donate them to the cause of their choice.

One of the primary reasons for doing this is to promote cultural exchange. Participating in the Augusta show really drove home to us the fact that there are really exciting creative communities out there who have no knowledge of each other. We drive past the Augusta exits on I-95 dozens of times a year, never realizing that there is a community of artists doing great things there. We hope that by having these touring capsule galleries we can start making connections between the communities.

Of course, this project will be a more successful with more people involved! So we’re seeking Sponsors and Collaborators.

Sponsorship is easy. We’d love to add more stops to the tour, and for that we’ll need more vending machines. The sponsor’s role would be to purchase a machine and capsules for a location close to them. This represents a $100-$200 investment. We’ll tell you what to look for and how to get the best deals on machines & capsules.

Collaboration is a little more work. Collaborators will be showing their work in the machines. They’ll be creating the materials and the signage. Even though collaborators keep the proceeds, this is not a money making venture by any means. At best, we hope to cover materials costs. It’s OK though, because we’re on a mission. With every purchase we’re providing a new way to experience creative work. We’re looking for collaborators who share this view and who understand the fun of selling things out of capsules! We’re calling it collaboration, but the machine you’re in is all about you. We won’t be plastering the Callithump! logo all over it (unless you want us to), so all the attention will go to the artist. We will, however, share our knowledge of making tiny artist’s multiples, and any other information, enthusiasm and support we can provide.

Hosting. We also need locations for these machines to reside. If you have a gallery, creative concern, coffee shop or other venue where these could find a home, let us know! We’re asking you to volunteer your space and not take a cut.

There’s no reason why sponsors, collaborators and hosts can’t all be one-in-the-same. We’re open to ideas! Please contact us by leaving a comment below.

UPDATE: We’re presenting this as an open-ended question. We think it’s a great idea but we haven’t worked out all the details yet, which is how it should be. The primary goal is to increase awareness and facilitate communication amongst the various creative communities in Maine. It wouldn’t be much of a collaboration if we just told everyone what to do! So let’s all figure out how to make this work!

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7 replies on “Callithump! now seeking Collaborators, Sponsors and Hosts”

I may be interested in selling art work through the vending machines.
Can you please provide me with more information?

Sure! The first thing to do would be to get a 2″ capsule out of a toy capsule vending machine. It’s the standard 50-cent size you find outside supermarkets. Try creating a few things to fit the space. We think of this as a fun creative challenge. The piece must fit the space, be able to reproduced many times (around 200 or so), and cost less than 50 cents a piece. We don’t figure in the cost of our time when we do this. For us the reward is in the creating and the sharing. Think of this as a way of promoting your work, getting it seen by different audiences, and providing them with a new way of interacting with it. Even though artists will get 100% of the proceeds from You’d also be creating an 8″ X 8″ display card for the machine, like the ones you see in the capsule toy vending machines. This should instill a sense of desire and make people want to put 50 cents into the machine to buy your work. Each capsule should also include a little write-up, like a fortune cookie fortune sized version of what would hang on the wall if your work were in a gallery. It should also contain info as to how to find out more about you and your work.

We’d really like to get 12 machines going. That way each artist could display for a year. We’re open to having them anywhere, but we’d prefer for them to be in Maine in points north of Portland. Portland already has a highly visible and well-supported creative community. But there’s so much more amazing stuff happening in points beyond Portland that people don’t know about, and we’d love to get that more visibility.

This is such a great idea. I’ve seen this done with old cigarette machines, where the work is bigger and more a lot more expensive. I really love the small works and the standard price of your idea. Please keep my gallery in mind as a possible place for one of your vending machines. Maybe the gallery could have it for a few weeks in Waterville and then we could move it to the Railroad Square Cinema, also in Waterville for a while. I’m not sure on how you plan on rotating them but we’d love to be considered.

Waterville would be such a perfect location for a machine! We’d love to have one there.

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