Prompt: Winter 2022

In the opening scene of Agnès Varda’s The Beaches of Agnès (2008), talking about herself, Varda says, “If you opened other people up, you’d find landscapes. If you opened me up, you’d find beaches.”

Beaches, for Varda, are a thread of her life; and her journey begins as a child on the beaches of Belgium. Tell us about the thread of your life. Where does your journey begin? If we opened you up, what would we find? Landscapes? Beaches? A non-place? A person? A scent? A thing? 

Agnès Varda, The Beaches of Agnès.

Femme Maison, Louis Bourgeois.

Dictee, Theresa Hak Kyung Cha.

The Day I Became a Woman, Marzieh Meshkini.

Ways to Use the Prompt

  1. Don’t use it at all. Submit the work that is most alive to you.

  2. Engage with the prompt obliquely.

  3. Engage with the prompt directly.

  4. Surprise us completely.