WHAT is Bait/Switch?
Instructions for 'Head, Body, and Legs' from The Boy's Modern Playmate (1891).
Bait/Switch is an initiative dedicated to inspiring, connecting, and supporting creative people across disciplines. We strive to make the world a more beautiful place and believe in creating lasting community through art.
The goal of Bait/Switch is to create an enormous body of work that spans time, space, and sensory experience. Our platform allows multiple artists to contribute to the same corpus, an ever-expanding chain of creative call and response.
Bait/Switch is inspired by art party games which are usually played by passing folded up pieces of paper around a table. These activities can be traced back to Victorian evening parlour games such as ‘Consequences’ and ‘Head, Body, and Legs’.
In the 1920’s, the Surrealists reinvented these little titillations as a battery of methods for automatic writing and image making, including the famous Exquisite Corpse. These techniques were embraced as a kind of bridge to the collective unconscious. Automating certain elements of the creative process was seen as a way to tap directly into the subconscious without the rational mind getting in the way.
The Surrealists believed that creative genius could be a shared experience, a theory which seems especially interesting now, when cultural phenomena such as social media seem to connect people in a way that ironically feels extremely impersonal. In an essay about Exquisite Corpse published in 1948, Pierre Schneider wrote that “some artists went so far as to expect a miraculous flora to bloom on it.”
Flora aside, we do expect something miraculous to occur. We believe in the power of art as a device for interdisciplinary communication and champion the excitement of synaesthetic experience. We also believe in the beauty of receiving a ‘prompt’ as a creative jump-start, especially for those of us who are no longer in school. Through this initiative, we see ourselves as explorers, and cannot wait to see what we discover.
Addendum [June 6, 2020]: When Bait/Switch started I envisioned a project that could transcend the boundaries of perception, time, and physical space. I never kidded myself that all involved are not firmly grounded in the real world, a world where being able to transcend all those things is a privilege not all have.
Bait/Switch exists not apart from our deeply flawed world filled with injustice, disparity, hatred, anger, and sorrow but as a reaction to it. It is a call to action for a better world. From day one, all voices and messages have been encouraged. We do not shy away from difficult subjects that force us to confront our prejudices and assumptions. Bait/Switch will never be a platform for hate, racism, sexism, homophobia, or transphobia.
These are ideals that exist in my soul, and are thereby inseparable from this grand project, however I did not make these ideals clear and concrete from day one, something I deeply regret. Let this serve as an addendum to the Bait/Switch mission statement.
- Lu Valena, Executive Director
How Does It Work?
Throughout history, the word ‘artist’ has had many different meanings. Here at Bait/Switch, we consider the most inclusive definition to also be the best: any person who expresses themselves through a medium. If through this definition you identify yourself as an artist, we invite you to become a contributor.
When you sign up to become a contributor, your name will be put on a list. When it is your turn, you will receive an email confirming that you are ready to participate, which you must reply to within 24 hours in order to move forward. Once it has been established that you’re ready to go, you will be given a creative work of some kind. Depending on the preferences you select in your contributor application, it could take any number of forms- it may be a drawing, a piece of music, a cocktail, etc. After you have received the work, you will have a given amount of time to create a response to it using your own form of self expression.
For most disciplines the time limit will be two weeks, but certain contributors, such as music composers, will be given more time to allow for recording and other factors.
Shortly thereafter, we will follow up with you to conduct a short interview about the work and collect other materials, such as progress shots, etc. Your work will become a prompt for the next artist, and will be published in the following quarterly edition.
