Buffalo infringement Festival (BiF) artists will be let loose to "infringe" in spaces around CommonBound’s scheduled programming. Look for us during evening gatherings and lunchtime breaks, striking up spontaneous jam sessions in quiet corners, performing live music, dancing, painting, and duetting on the lawn of Rockwell Hall, or pulling in CommonBound attendees to participate in acts of creation and collaboration.
But don't get us wrong–we're not trying to take over; in fact, we're here to show how creative types add to any environment in which they are welcome, supplementing the festivities with an array of interactive and improvisatory BiF artists and movement-builders.
BiF is part of movement to change the way we think about art. It’s rooted in the belief that cooperation–among artists, venues, and audience–enables art to happen, anywhere. And wherever these spaces exist, “infringement” is possible. This belief, and the space we seek to create for art and artists in our communities and in our economic system, is a radically different approach, and one we feel strongly complements the vision of deep systemic change upon which CommonBound and a New Economy is founded.
What is infringement?
BiF is a non-commercial, non-hierarchical resource-sharing economy dedicated to the expression of experimental, controversial, and anti-establishment artwork of all forms. Taking place in multiple, often unconventional, venues in and around Buffalo, the festival is an annual 11-day event running from the last weekend of July through the first weekend of August. Every artist proposal is accepted, and artists participate for free. Their festival in Buffalo is only one of a growing international infringement movement, with a shared Mandate, that holds festivals in a number of North American cities.
The BiF philosophy and approach
BiF is dedicated to the belief that art has a greater purpose than to entertain or to make a quick buck. Unfortunately, the modern-day arts world is increasingly degenerated by commercialism, elitism, and closed-mindedness. In this climate, the vast majority of art inevitably grows more and more toothless, perfunctory, and irrelevant. To counter this, we have undertaken to claw out a small niche where artists are free–both ideologically and financially–to create as they wish.
Visit www.infringebuffalo.org for more information.
