Application Deadline: October 30, 2026

Crossing the River:
An Examination of Borders and Bridges

Prompt: This portfolio is an invitation to other artists/printmakers to consider the conceptual nature of borders and bridges in a way that expresses personal narrative, metaphor, or political/national designations. We are calling for work that examines how personal and political identities are connected across multiple intersections. These intersections can allow flow between areas of cultural or national identity, as well as purely geographic or ecological zones.

The format of this portfolio exchange is meant to reflect the theme. For each print in the portfolio, we are asking participants to create a diptych using two matrices on a single sheet of paper. The outside dimensions of the work must be 11” x 14” (including both portions of the diptych). Artists are encouraged to engage with the possibilities presented by diptych form and how it relates to the theme of this portfolio, and to consider how the diptych represents two elements that meet (a border) but are connected in some way (a bridge). The orientation (horizontal or vertical) can be determined by the artist. 

Conference Info: Crossing The River is an official “Themed Portfolio Exchange” to be exhibited at the SGCI 2027 Confluence conference in Pittsburgh, PA in October 2027.

To be eligible for the Portfolio, one must be an SGCI member at an “advocate” level to participate. This can be obtained through the SGCI website SGCInternational.org

Timeline:

  • October 31, 2026: Round 2 Call for Proposals closes

  • November 15, 2026: Notification of participation from program leads

  • Editions are due mid-June 2027

  • Compile portfolio - mid July 2027

  • Mail out completed portfolios (including SGCI Archive copy) - end of August 2027

  • SGCI conference exhibition/ Pittsburgh PA - Oct 13 - 17

Details: Organizers - Jenn Manzella & Ted Mosher

The exchange will include 20 total participants including the two curators/organizers. The edition size is 24 to account for four archival copies of the portfolio (one of these is to be exhibited at the conference for the host institution), two for BYO Print (the lead organizers are BYO members) and one for the SGCI archives.

Interested artists should submit a brief description of how they plan to approach the diptych requirement for the portfolio in the application. There is no expectation that the two parts of the diptych will be equivalent or rectilinear; the matrices can take any form within the 11” x 14” outside paper dimensions.

Prints in this themed exchange are to be exhibited at the SGCI conference in October 2027.

Links:

https://www.sgcinternational.org/confluence-participation-call/

https://www.sgcinternational.org/confluence-participation-call/#portfolios