Acts of Address: Gesture, Image and the World We Speak To

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– Open Call for Artists

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Deadline: 13 August 2026

Exhibition Dates: 1-30 September  2026

 

SUBMISSIONS NOW OPEN!

 

CISTA ARTS invites artists to submit work for Acts of Address, an online exhibition taking place in September 2026. We welcome submissions from artists working across all visual art disciplines.​

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– Exhibition Theme: 

Every artwork addresses someone or something. It may speak directly, remain quiet, offer a sign, hold a trace, make a demand, open a conversation, or create a space for recognition. 
A work may address a viewer, a loved one, a stranger, a community, a place, an archive, an absent body, a political condition, a private memory, or an imagined future.
Acts of Address invites artists to consider how images, objects, gestures and materials communicate. 
The exhibition looks at the ways artworks reach beyond themselves: through language, silence, touch, movement, symbolism, protest, ritual, correspondence, refusal, care, intimacy, distance, public voice or quiet presence.
This theme is deliberately open and welcomes a wide range of approaches. 
Artists may respond through painting, drawing, photography, sculpture, installation, collage, textiles, digital work, moving image, sound, performance documentation, text-based work, mixed media or interdisciplinary practice. 
Submissions may be figurative or abstract, personal or collective, direct or ambiguous.
At a time when communication is often fragmented, accelerated or mediated through screens, Acts of Address asks what it means to reach another person, to be heard, to remain silent, to translate experience, or to hold space for what cannot be easily said. 
The exhibition is interested in works that explore how meaning is formed between the artwork and its audience, between private experience and public expression, and between the visible and the unspoken.
Artists are encouraged to interpret the theme broadly. 
Works may explore the body as a site of gesture, the image as a form of communication, the material object as a carrier of memory, or the artwork as an invitation, message, question, encounter or act of witness.
Acts of Address seeks to bring together works that consider how art can speak across distance, difference and uncertainty, while opening new ways of seeing, listening and responding.

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We look forward to receiving your inspiring contributions.

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– Submission Guidelines

 

Deadline: 13 August 2026

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We are keen to learn about you! Please send us the following information, along with a sample of your work and an up-to-date CV:

• Contact information (full name, email, mobile)

• Details of the artworks (title, size, medium, year, price)

• Artist statement (max 100 words on how your work relates to the theme)

• Short biography (max 100 words, third-person)

• Up to 4 sample images of your work

Please note: Only two artworks per artist will be selected for exhibition.

​Please send your email to info@cistaarts.com and quote ‘Acts of Address' in the subject field.

Or apply via CuratorSpace.

 

– Selected Participants Will Receive:​

• Exhibition of your work on the CISTA ARTS online platform.

• The exhibition will launch in September 2026.

• We will publish a professionally produced paperback catalogue of the exhibition in the UK.

• You will receive a complimentary PDF copy of the exhibition catalogue.

• If your work sells, Cista Arts will take no commission.

• Your work will be featured in our daily social media posts titled 'Meet the Artist' during the exhibition.

• The exhibition will be prominently displayed on our homepage during the exhibition period and will later be archived on the 'Past Exhibitions' page.

• We will tag you in our social media posts, and your website or social media account will be linked to your artworks on our exhibition page. This ensures ongoing promotion for all participating artists during and after the exhibition.

• You will receive a certificate of participation.

 

Apply to this exhibition opportunity is free, if your work is accepted, there will be a £30 fee for one accepted artwork and a £50 fee for two accepted artworks. 

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– PARTICIPATION BENEFITS:
Selected artists will have their work exhibited online for the full month on our homepage, included in a professionally produced printed and digital exhibition catalogue, featured in daily social media promotion under our ‘Meet the Artist’ series, and receive a certificate of participation. CISTA ARTS takes no commission on sales.

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For more information, please get in touch with us at info@cistaarts.com