Announcing the return of the Fringe Festival Yard Art Tour!

YAT2

Yard Art, by the broadest definition possible.

A Tour, by the loosest definition possible.

The “Yard” part? Well, that’s where you put the art. It can be…out in a yard. Maybe tucked into a garden. On the front porch. On a wall, in a window, on a roof, out in a driveway, up on a fence, hanging from a tree, half-hidden in a bush, inside a coupla planters. In the middle of an empty lot. Some place where folks can see it from the sidewalk, more-or-less.

The “Art” part? You define what that is.

The “Tour” part? You send us a photo and a short blurb about your art and where it is. We put your photos and blurbs on a map - on an interactive New Orleans Fringe web-page and on a printed version. Folks get the map, and they decide what yard art they wanna see and they wander around and look at it.

The “YAT2” part? C’mon, this is New Orleans.

YAT2, coming to you on the heels of the wild success of YAT1 during the 2011 New Orleans Fringe Festival. Look for YAT2 November 14-18, 2012

Click here to register your yard art.

Why YAT2 during Fringe Fest?

The Fringe Festival in November will bring out thousands of theater-goers over the course of five days and five nights.  These theater-goers will be flowing from venue to venue, drifting through the Marigny & Bywater neighborhoods, and enjoying live performance art.

Now how about we give these festival goers the chance to enjoy visual art in addition to performance art?  Lo and behold the concept for YAT! 

Alotta those theater-goers would be delighted to walk an extra block or turn a different corner on their way from one venue to another venue, so they can see another bit o’ art along their way. Alotta those theater-goers would be delighted to ride their bikes to Bywater-Marigny in the afternoon before the Fringe shows start, so they can drift around the neighborhood looking at a bit of fun, wacky, poignant, pointed yard art.

Alotta visual artists have asked how they can get involved in the Fringe Festival, show their work to our audiences. Here ya go, the neighborhood is your gallery. Outsider art, uh-huh. The front porch is the new white box.

‘Course, yard art is already mildy endemic in Bywater-Marigny. It’s the kinda neighborhood where a simple hole at the bottom of a fence-board is re-envisioned as a tiny, off-beat front door for someone’s kittycat. Where an iron Papa Legba watches over an alleyway, a repurposed cocktail lounge marquee points us to a dog house, and dozens of colorful zip-ties appear spontaneously on a telephone guy-wire.

Fringe. Yard. Art. Tour.

Nuts & Bolts of Registering Yard Art:

YAT2 is a self-guided walking/driving public art tour organized by the New Orleans Fringe Festival.  Property owners and artists can register their addresses with New Orleans Fringe as points of interest on the tour. Click here to register online.

New Orleans Fringe will produce a map and legend for the public to use as a guide, available online at www.nofringe.org and in hard-copy at the Free-For-All Tent during the festival. New Orleans Fringe will promote YAT2 specifically and alongside other Fringe events in festival promotional materials and activities, and will provide YAT2 placards at registered sites/artworks.

YAT2 is completely FREE to artists and the public.

Yard Art Registration Guidelines:

1. YAT2 will take place primarily during the 2012 Fringe Fest, 14-18 November. We recognize that many yard artworks are permanent or semi-permanent installations, others are highly ephemeral. All are welcome. We figure that as far as overlap with the festival audiences, there will probably be more Yard Art Tourists out and about on Saturday & Sunday November 17th & 18th, from Noon – 7:00 pm.
2. All registered art must be outdoors or visible from outdoors, free to view, and open to the public.
3. All registered art must be either visible from the sidewalk or street, or accessible to pedestrians.
   
   * note: if you’re considering doing yard art in a spot that can’t be seen from the sidewalk, for example in a fenced backyard, you might want to think about the need to host it, and what that would mean as far as time commitment. ‘Course, if you’re gonna host it, well, then maybe ya have a party or a happening on your hands, which may be very very cool. Or not, that’s up to you.
4. New Orleans Fringe does not assume any responsibility for public safety on private property associated with YAT2.
5. New Orleans Fringe is not responsible for clean-up or repair of private property associated with YAT2. 
6. Registering artists must have permission from property owner before returning registration application. 
7. Registration Application must be returned to New Orleans Fringe by Monday October 15th at 7:00 pm in order to ensure inclusion on the YAT2 map and legend.
8. Please don’t undertake projects that will get you in trouble with the law or projects that are horrendously unreasonable impositions on your neighbors.
9. Defacing or destroying someone else's property without their permission is completely unacceptable.

Ready to register your yard art for YAT2? Click here for the online form.

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