MOZAIK Philanthropy Opens Circular Art Exhibition "Ecosystem X"

LOS ANGELES, Feb. 15, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- To rethink existing paradigms and co-create positive futures through the visionary power of art, national foundation MOZAIK Philanthropy has launched its latest virtual group exhibition titled Ecosystem X, showcasing the artworks of 40 U.S. based artists from a diverse array of backgrounds, mediums, and creative expressions. Using the cross-cultural symbol of the circle to engender a sense of non-hierarchy while viewing the art, the exhibition's novel circular structure centers audiences as active participants in the creative process.

On a mission to democratize philanthropy in the arts, MOZAIK Philanthropy first conceived of the Future Art Awards at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic as a way to issue financial relief to artists through a new philanthropic model called flow funding, which encourages the dynamic flow of financial and social capital spontaneously through the hands of new funders in an effort to democratize philanthropy. MOZAIK has been issuing emergency grants directly to artists in the same way that they might receive a federal stimulus check in the mail. The Future Art Awards has now grown into a professional lifeline for hundreds of emerging and established artists using contemporary art as a medium for social change.

MOZAIK Philanthropy convened an independent jury of artists to review the art submissions through a blind review process, awarding over $80,000 in artist honorariums for Ecosystem X, including the inaugural Future Student Art Prize to California State University, Fullerton (CSUF) artist Mahtab Mohammadi. Collectively, MOZAIK Philanthropy has extended more than $350,000 in artist support grants since the onset of the pandemic in early 2020.

Now on view, the featured artists showcasing in the Ecosystem X exhibition include sculptor Carol Anne McChrystal from Los Angeles, CA; photographer Eliza McKenna from Brooklyn, NY; ecological artists Kaitlin Bryson & Beata Tsosie-Peña from Reno, NV; New York-based visual artist, Jingyi Wang; interdisciplinary artist Ivy Guild from San Diego, CA; nomadic artist Kristi Rauckis from Flagstaff, AZ; New Canton, VA documentarian Mara Adamitz Scrupe; landscape sculptor and eco-conscious architect Pasha Radetzki from New York, NY; mixed-media artist Pam Douglas from Los Angeles, CA; and post-modern artist collective Solarpunk Surf Club from Madison, WI.

Jury members of the Future Art Awards: Ecosystem X include: Stacey R. Queen, educator, artist, art historian, and blogger; Native Hawaiian artist, illustrator, and visionary, Solomon Robert Nui Enos, art, architecture, and social historian, Leah Gallant; artist, anti-violence advocate, scholar, teacher, mother, and citizen of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, Kimberly Robertson, Chinese sculptor, Jiannan Wu; Haitian American, self-taught cartoonist, Jason "JaFLEU" Fleurant; 18-year-old production design artist, Jacob Wiant, and Iranian Interdisciplinary visual artist, Ghazal Rahimi.

Each Future Art Awards jury is composed of featured and special mention artists and art writers from the previous Future Art Awards and Future Art Writer Awards, modeling a circular economy where previous prize-winners 'pay it forward' to the next generation of grantees in the arts.

Previously, over 100 artists have been featured in the 2020 and 2021 Future Art Awards, ranging across all ages and career stages, including photographers, painters, sculptors, street artists, muralists, mixed-media artists, visual, multi and interdisciplinary artists, illustrators, animators, 3D artists, Web3 poets, cartoonists, technologists, filmmakers, art writers, composers, weavers, dancers, and creative performers.

"The Future Art Awards has become a home for a community of future-thinking artists to express their hopes, dreams, and aspirations for a better world to come. This 2022 exhibition reimagines the symbiotic interrelationship between humanity and the Earth, illustrating that art holds the power to remap and re-code our collective trajectory around polemics like climate, human rights, and democracy," said Keely Badger, Executive Director of MOZAIK Philanthropy. "We are especially excited to showcase how artists interpreted this cycle's theme—Ecosystem X—using their art to rethink existing paradigms and co-create positive futures."

The exhibition is now on view, free, and open to the public.

Please visit: https://mozaikphilanthropy.org/ecosystemx/

SOURCE MOZAIK Philanthropy

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