Overview

Now in its third edition, the Field of Vision series is rooted in Central Illinois and continues to build a regional conversation around photography, place, and everyday visual experience. Following the 2024 and 2025 editions, the 2026 iteration, In Plain Sight, invites photographers working in Central Illinois and across the Midwest to submit projects that look closely at the spaces, routines, landscapes, and histories that often remain overlooked.

Curated by Tim Hale, In Plain Sight considers the Midwest not as a fixed outline on a map, but as a layered visual condition shaped by land use, settlement, industry, ecology, movement, memory, labor, and time. The exhibition asks how photography can help us see what is often overlooked or taken for granted.

The Midwest is often defined by state boundaries or census regions, but those lines rarely describe how space is actually lived, shaped, or seen. Central Illinois remains a point of reference within a broader landscape.

Projects may be documentary, poetic, experimental, archival, conceptual, or process-based. Submissions may engage with ancestral, settler, vernacular, transitional, residual, agrarian, domestic, peripheral, represented, or lived spaces. We welcome work that is quiet, observational, personal, social, historical, or speculative. The emphasis is not on a single image of “the Midwest,” but on a coherent body of work that helps us look more carefully at what has been in plain sight all along.

Photographers at all stages of practice are encouraged to apply. Selected works will be presented as part of the Field of Vision exhibition series and may also be considered for related programming, artist talks, interviews, online features, and publications.

Call for Photographers

In Plain Sight seeks cohesive photographic projects that respond to place, region, and the overlooked everyday in Central Illinois and the Midwest.

Applicants should submit 5–10 images from a photographic project or short series, along with a brief project statement and a short artist bio. Work may be complete or in progress, but it should show a clear visual direction and a meaningful relationship to the exhibition theme.

Three selected projects will also be chosen for development into small-format Field of Vision zines, extending the exhibition into a publication form and giving selected photographers an additional way to present their work as a sequence.

What to Submit:

Applicants should submit:

• 5–10 images from a cohesive photographic project or short series

• A brief project statement describing the work and how it relates to place

• A short artist bio

• Optional: sequencing notes, installation preferences, or publication/zine ideas

Image links may be submitted through Google Drive, Dropbox, WeTransfer, Adobe Portfolio, a personal website, or similar platforms. Please make sure all links are accessible.

Selection:

Work will be reviewed by a selection committee in relation to the exhibition theme and overall conversation.

The committee will consider the strength and coherence of the photographic work, the relationship to place and regional experience, the thoughtful use of the photographic medium, and how the images work together as a project or sequence.

Selected photographers will be notified by November 1, 2026.

Exhibition and Zine Opportunity:

Selected works will be exhibited at Analog Wine Bar in Urbana, Illinois, from December 5, 2026 to January 5, 2027.

In addition to the exhibition, three selected projects will be developed into small-format zines as part of the Field of Vision series with Immaterial Books. These zines will highlight photographic projects that show particular strength as sequences and offer another way for the work to circulate beyond the exhibition.

Selected artists may also be invited to participate in public programming, artist talks, interviews, online features, or future Field of Vision publications.

Public Programming + Community:

In Plain Sight will include a public program designed to bring photographers, artists, and the local community together around photography, place, and everyday visual experience.

Alongside the exhibition, we are developing two related events: a photography meet-up with artist talks and an open work-share, and a social photo walk through Urbana/Champaign. Together, these programs extend the exhibition beyond the gallery wall and create space for conversation, connection, and shared looking.

Field of Vision Meet-Up

This informal gathering will bring together photographers and image-makers to share work, hear short artist talks, and connect with others working through questions of place, region, and visual storytelling.

Selected photographers will be invited to speak briefly about their work, process, and relationship to the exhibition theme. Participants may also bring a small selection of work in progress to share informally with others.

The meet-up is intended as a space for exchange rather than formal critique — a place to discuss images, sequences, projects, zines, books, exhibitions, and the different ways photographic work can take shape.

In Plain Sight Photo Walk + Bar Crawl

The photo walk invites participants to move through Urbana/Champaign together and photograph what is often overlooked: ordinary streets, storefronts, signs, interiors, alleys, thresholds, traces of labor, and the small visual details of everyday life.

The walk will include simple looking prompts and informal social stops along the route. Participants are welcome to use phones, film cameras, digital cameras, instant cameras, or any other image-making device.

This event is open to photographers, artists, students, neighbors, and anyone interested in looking more closely at the places around them.

Full public program details will be announced closer to the exhibition opening.

Artist Benefits

Selected artists will receive:

• Inclusion in the In Plain Sight exhibition

• Possible selection for one of three small-format Field of Vision zines

• Participation in public programming and artist talks

• Promotion through Immaterial Gallery channels

• Possible inclusion in related online features, interviews, podcasts, or publications

• Consideration for future Field of Vision survey projects

As the series develops, Field of Vision may also lead toward a larger regional photography publication or survey book.

Key Dates

• Submission Deadline: October 1, 2026

• Notification: November 1, 2026

• Exhibition Opening / Public Program: December 5, 2026

• Exhibition Dates: December 5, 2026 – January 5, 2027

Submission Fee

The submission fee is $25.

This fee supports the administration, review, promotion, public programming, and publication activity connected to the exhibition series. Submission does not guarantee selection.

How to Submit

Submissions are completed through the Immaterial Gallery online store. To submit work for In Plain Sight, click the Submit Your Work — $25 button and complete the submission form attached to the checkout item.

You will be asked to provide your contact information, project title, artist statement, artist bio, image link, and related project details before completing payment.

Please submit a link to 5–10 images using Google Drive, Dropbox, WeTransfer, Adobe Portfolio, a personal website, or a similar platform. Make sure your link is accessible and that sharing permissions are open. If we cannot access your files, we may contact you for a corrected link before review.

The submission fee is $25. This fee supports the administration, review, promotion, public programming, and publication activity connected to the exhibition series. Submission does not guarantee selection.

Selected photographers will be notified by November 1, 2026.