Manifesto
“Poetry surrounds us everywhere, but putting it on paper is, alas, not so easy as looking at it.”
—Vincent van Gogh
The Upon Paper Project
UPON PAPER is a new on-line and off-line project for contemporary international creative arts; spanning photography, the fine arts, design and the applied arts from architecture to animation, craft to technology.
UPON PAPER is an initiative of Hahnemühle FineArt. The project emerged from Hahnemühle‘s close connection with art and form, and from a desire to create a contemporary and open exchange between all art forms. One that goes beyond paper. UPON PAPER will be the artistic branch of Hahnemühle, a company with unparallelled expertise in the manufacturing of papers for traditional and digital artists.
Founded in 1584, Hahnemühle FineArt is the leading international manufacturer of high-quality papers for artists, photographers and the graphic design industry, as well as for traditional art techniques, such as watercolor and drawing (Traditional FineArt) and for the digital processing of photography (Digital FineArt). Over the centuries Hahnemühle has developed a distinctive corporate culture of quality and innovation, serving artists and creatives on five continents from the small town of Dassel in Lower Saxony with 150 members of staff.
UPON PAPER is intended to become a real and virtual “white space”—through its three platforms of Magazine, Space and Online—for art works on paper, professionally curated at the highest level. In addition, UPON PAPER will become an on-and off-line platform for the presentation and sale of contemporary international print editions, and works on paper of all creative generes.
UPON PAPER online initiates and encourages interactivity between users and artists. Users are invited to generate and curate content which is uploaded onto website. Acting as extra eyes and ears to the Upon Paper team, our users become part of the editorial team. Content posted to UPON YOU will be considered for extended features online, and outstanding work of note will be published in each issue of the biannual magazine, and inclusion in Upon Paper exhibitions.
The first UPON PAPER space in Berlin is now open. From here we will continue and open spaces in London, New York and Bejing to establish and support our activities in Europe, North America and Asia. The blend of established and new international talent presented across the three platforms creates a stress field which precisely reflects today’s landscape of contemporary art and design, and will fertilize “paperworks” in general. Exhibitions will be held within own spaces, and also “tour” to partner galleries around the world.
