Liquid Commonwealth: The Art and Life of Water in Virginia

About the Open Call

Entries are now open for a juried exhibition co-sponsored by the Muscarelle Museum of Art and the Department of Art & Art History at William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. Liquid Commonwealth: The Art and Life of Water in Virginia seeks to explore the essential importance, richness, and beauty of water as a defining element of Virginia for all its residents. This exhibition will explore the essential importance, richness, and beauty of water as a defining element of Virginia for all its residents. Co-sponsored by the Department of Art & Art History and the Muscarelle Museum of Art as the culminating outcome of the Fall 2025 Curatorial Project course (ARTH 331), the exhibition will be titled Liquid Commonwealth: The Art and Life of Water in Virginia. Water has become a familiar topic in recent contemporary art, but exhibitions have tended to emphasize national and international issues or very local concerns. Liquid Commonwealth takes a different approach by making the state of Virginia — and Virginia artists — its theme. Through an invitational approach to selection and curation, the exhibition will encourage artists of any community and locale in Virginia to express a range of perceptions, concerns, and joys about water as an essential element of life. Although water certainly has both urgent political significance and abstract conceptual interest, the project proposed here deliberately celebrates the variety of ways in which the inhabitants of our commonwealth experience water as a tangible source of inspiration – materially, emotionally, spiritually, aesthetically, and more. This is not to say politics or criticality are unwelcome, especially at a time when climate change and pollution pose daunting challenges, but the exhibition seeks to be truly inclusive of a broad scope of perspectives in order to reflect the richly diverse aquatic dimensions of Virginia as a place shaped by various liquid environments: the Atlantic Ocean, the Chesapeake Bay, and more than seventy rivers and lakes from the Shenandoah to the Eastern Shore, not to mention atmospheric water, underground aquifers, and the many human-made reservoirs and systems that sustain life for all species. The exhibition will serve as the final project for the Fall 2025 Curatorial Project class (ARTH 331).

What is Offered

First Place: $5,000, Second Place: $3,000, Third Place: $2,000

Requirements

The Exhibition is open to all artists who are over eighteen years old and legal residents of Virginia, except for Muscarelle Museum of Art employees and/or William & Mary faculty. All submissions must be original artwork created by the Artist themselves (AI generated submissions are not accepted). The Artist must not submit works that infringe on the rights of a third party. Works in all mediums and styles will be considered, so long as they adhere to the theme of water in Virginia. Selected works must be delivered to the Museum ready for installation with all hanging hardware and reinforcements intact, functional and able to fully support the artwork. The Museum cannot accept works of art with live plant matter or soil. Artists are responsible for the packing and transport to and from the Museum.

How to Apply

The application form will request Name, Email Address, Artist Statement (optional – you may upload a document if preferred), Documentation Image, Title of Work, Date of Work, Brief Description of the Work (optional – you may upload a document if preferred), Second Submission (if applicable) with the same information, and Agreement to Terms. Artists may submit up to two works in any medium (born digital, mixed media, painting, photography, sculpture, etc.). Please submit images as a JPEG file with a resolution of 300 dpi. Artists will also be given the opportunity to provide a brief biography (no more than 200 words) and a statement (approx. 300 words) explaining the context and relevance of their submitted works. Identifying information will not be shared with the student jurors prior to their selection for the Exhibition.