WOW HUH

Website: http://wowhuh.com/

How is the project operated?
For all intents and purposes, it is artist-run. Any costs are paid for out of pocket and we don’t receive any special funding. We rely a lot on the generosity of other artists and writers who are eager to share their work without monetary compensation.

How long has it been in existence?
Roughly three years now.

What was your motivation?
The motivation was mostly to fill a perceived gap in arts writing, namely the lack of critical, longer form essays by younger writers. We cast a pretty wide net though so ultimately the motivation was to create a space that had no overt agenda aside from presenting critical perspectives on culture. We mostly focus on contemporary art but, when we reach out to people for contributions, we don’t demand for that to be their focus.

Number of organizers/responsible persons of the project.
Three. Lap Le, Talon Gustafson, and Patrick Gantert.

How are programs funded?
Entirely out of pocket.

Who is responsible for the programming?
The three of us are primarily responsible for the programming.

Number and average duration of exhibitions/events per year.
Four releases per year.

What kind of events are usually organized?
We release the issues digitally and we threw a party once at the Call Box Lounge.

How is your programming determined?
We each reach out to artists and writers on our own asking if they’d be interested in contributing. If they agree, we work with them through an editing process leading up to the release. Our contributors are always very self-directed and we’ve never structured an issue around any specific topic.

Do you accept proposals/submissions?
Yes.

What is your artistic/curatorial approach?
The approach is very loose and simple. We keep the visual presentation of the site as basic as possible and try to work with people that we think are interesting and that we believe have important ideas.

What’s working? What’s not working?
A laid back approach to organization is mostly excellent but sometimes troublesome. Getting all of the writing together and loaded into the site on time is sometimes a bit of a challenge. Overall, we’ve got a lot of the kinks worked out but we learn from every issue what works and what doesn’t. It keeps us on our toes.

What kind of role do you hope to play in your local art scene or community?
Our main goal is to create a platform for people to try things out. If it’s writing, that’s great and most of our site has been dedicated to that but we’re open to branching out into artist projects as well. Ultimately, we’re interested in being a resource that other people involved in the same activities can benefit from and be in dialogue with.

What idea are you most excited about for the future?
Keeping the site running and growing is what we’re primarily excited about. Making these things happen in the time between our jobs and studios is tough so every posting is exciting. But as we put out more and more releases, the attention to the site increases and gives us a wider audience. More people looking at it might make it a more desirable place to host unique projects from other artists or writers so that’s something we’re kicking around. Mostly, we’re just excited to see it continue and see it become a place that people go to and put to use in some way. Enabling our peers to push what they are doing and then giving something back.