Call Description

Animals
Online Exhibition

September 17, 2025 - October 17, 2025

Since humans first painted animals on cave walls, artists have explored our complex relationship with the creatures that share our world. This juried exhibition from Site:Brooklyn invites contemporary artists to examine the multifaceted role animals play in art and culture. 

We are seeking work that explores personal connections with animals, how animal materials have shaped artistic traditions, or how creatures serve as symbols in storytelling and political commentary. 

We welcome imaginative interpretations that present animals through fantasy, myth, or allegorical representation. Whether your work celebrates, critiques, or simply observes our relationship with the animal kingdom, Animals seeks to show how zoological subjects continue to inspire and challenge artists through painting, sculpture, photography, mixed media, and beyond.

About the Juror: Jesse Bandler Firestone is a curator, producer, and writer of contemporary art. He has held curatorial positions at Montclair State University, Wave Hill, The Shed, and Residency Unlimited. Across these roles, Firestone has organized exhibitions, commissions, and public programs that foreground process-driven and socially engaged practices, with particular attention to artists working through conceptual, queer, and discursive lineages.

At Wave Hill, he commissioned site-responsive projects that engaged the garden’s natural and social histories, including works exploring ecological restoration, human–nonhuman entanglements, animisms, and interspecies relations. At Montclair State University, he organized solo exhibitions and thematic group shows grounded in interdisciplinary analysis, connecting the University’s Galleries to a wide range of academic fields. At The Shed, he managed Open Call, an expansive commissioning program that supported 52 artists addressing topics from Indigeneity and ecology to technology and identity.

His exhibitions have been featured in The New York Times, Art F City, Hyperallergic, Artnet, Filthy Dreams, and other publications. In addition to his institutional work, Firestone is the founder of JFirestone Arts LLC, a curatorial and writing consultancy with clients including Sugar Hill Museum, Rhode Island School of Design, Harvard University, Kunstraum LLC, Facebook/META, and others. His writing has appeared in Sculpture Magazine, The Brooklyn Rail, Document Journal, Slate, and Baron Books.

About the Gallery: Site:Brooklyn Gallery is dedicated to exhibiting the current practice of contemporary artists. We are taking Site:Brooklyn online with a new series of interactive exhibitions. Our goal remains the same, to connect artists with an expert and diverse set of jurors through the open call format. Our new program focuses on online open call exhibitions, selected by a cast of new jurors, solo artist features, and spotlights. 

Dates:
Call Announcement: August 27, 2025
Final Submission Deadline: October 6, 2025 11:59 PM MT
Notification Letter: October 15, 2025
Online Exhibition: October 29, 2025 - November 29, 2025

Presentation: Once accepted, artists will be required to upload high-res photo files of their work. 

Sales/Commissions:
All artwork must be priced for sale.
Artwork must be available for sale during the exhibition and cannot be withdrawn before the end of the exhibit.
Artists will retain a 60% commission on all exhibition sales. The price represented on the artist entry form will be the sale price. 

Contact/Questions:
Please direct all questions to sitebrooklyn@sitebrooklyn.com

Application Requirements

Submissions and fees:
Only original works may be submitted. The fee is $26.00 for three (3) images, $10 for each additional image. If adding additional images please do so prior to check out.
All entries must be registered/received by October 6, 2025 11:59 PM MT
All entry fees are non-refundable.

Eligibility Criteria

Eligibility:
This is a juried exhibition for artists working in all media. This exhibition is open to all artists 18 years of age or older.