Last year, July CAM was put to sleep gently, to the sound of beating drums, cymbals, horns, and bells. But it didn't die forever. This year, celebrate with us the rebirth of CAM in its new incarnation: March.

The death parade was loud and bright, so get ready to make it look mournful by comparison with your craziest costumes and whatever you can find to play or bang on. Get in a celebratory mood, and meet up at:

4 PM, FEBRUARY 28, AT ROOSEVELT PARK
(between Lonestar Blvd & Grove, by the river)

We'll march down along the river to arrive at La Tuna bar for libations. Congratulations, it's a CAM!

Welcome to the new CAM website, with graphic design by Chuck Ramirez. The 2010 CAM calendar is now online, and will be available in the San Antonio Current throughout the month of March. It looks like CAM is starting early this year, with lots of events in February at the Southwest School of Art and Craft, David Shelton Gallery, Sala Diaz, and other spaces. But don't let that fool you... the official rebirth of CAM is on February 28 on the San Antonio River. Keep checking in as we highlight events on this page throughout next couple of months.

It’s hard to believe, but Contemporary Art Month is coming soon! The month-long contemporary art extravaganza is moving to March in 2010, which means it’s only three months away. We need your help to make sure all facets of San Antonio’s contemporary art community are represented. Because of the holidays, we are opening the calendar submission system a little early this year. Starting today, you can enter your exhibits, performances, and educational events on our website for inclusion in the 2010 CAM calendar. If you want to have your events listed in the print calendar in the San Antonio Current, be sure to have them in by January 15.

We’ve made a few changes since July. One of the biggest is that we are now accepting a new listing type: open studios. The CAM open studio day is Sunday, March 7, and any artist with a studio of some kind is encouraged to participate. There is no fee for this type of CAM listing.

We have also enabled image uploading capabilities for all listing types (not just exhibits), and you will be notified by email when your listings have been approved, instead of having to login to check your listings page. Finally, a map will be generated automatically for every venue and open studio listing.

If you submitted events in July, you already have an account. If you don’t have your password, you have two options. You can either dig up the email we sent you with your login information, or reset your password. The email should have a subject heading that reads “Account details for [your username] at Contemporary Art Month.” You can reset your password by visiting this page and entering your email address (or your username, if you remember it). If all else fails, please contact us and we can manually reset your password and/or update your email address.

As always, thank you for your continued support of CAM and San Antonio’s vibrant art community.

Contemporary Art Month is honored to work with the San Antonio Symphony to bring contemporary classical music to visual art venues all over the city. This project, which is still in the planning stages, will feature solo and small ensemble concerts by Symphony musicians throughout the month of March.

More details coming soon!

March 2010 will bring more cutting edge art and events than ever before, with city-wide exhibitions, special openings, studio and gallery tours, an awards ceremony, and endless opportunities for everyone to participate. In addition, for the first time, Luminaria, San Antonio's Arts Night, will coincide with CAM. Get ready for tag team action!

Contemporary Art Month is a grass roots participatory event: it builds on two dozen years of rich community devotion and depends as much as ever on YOUR involvement in March 2010.

Beginning December 1, CAM will begin accepting submissions for the official March 2010 calendar through this website. Until January 15, artists and arts institutions can enter their exhibitions, performances, events, and educational programs for inclusion in the calendar, which will be distributed online and in a free pull-out section in the San Antonio Current.

Everyone is free and encouraged to participate in both CAM and Luminaria, but Luminaria submissions are separate and the deadline is imminent.  Go to the Luminaria site for details.

Now that March is the new July, Contemporary Art Month will coincide with the city's annual Arts Night, Luminaria, which takes place Saturday, March 13.

Luminaria and Contemporary Art Month have partnered to ensure that the celebration of the arts in San Antonio extends beyond the evening of Luminaria, to the entire month of March.

Artists and arts organizations are free and encouraged to participate in both events. However, submissions are being handled separately and, be wary, deadlines vary.

Visit the Luminaria website for details.  The deadline for submission is October 30.

More on CAM submission details are on their way.

Thanks everyone for making the parade a great success!

If you didn't make it, here's some things to look at to show you how it went down:

The Death of Contemporary Art Month from The Prime Eights on Vimeo.

Mark & Angela Walley (The Prime Eights) made this video documenting the parade.

Julie Garcia of the San Antonio Express News has an article up in Art Beat.

Benjamin Olivo has this post in The Downtown Blog, with lots of pictures! More pictures at this slideshow in the San Antonio Express News

Thanks to the more than 50 people that showed up to give the July CAM a proper send-off to the underworld!

In commemoration of this final July CAM, everyone's invited to the Death of Contemporary Art Month Parade. Wear a costume, bring an instrument, and march for the Death of CAM. Long Live CAM!

The parade happens on the last Sunday in July.  That's the 26th.  We'll gather at 8pm at the Josephine Street River Tunnel Inlet Park, and march south to El Tropicano Hotel and Tiki Bar.

We're currently looking for participants to assist us in getting ready for the Death of CAM Parade. Especially team leaders and captains, drummers, costume-makers, and other contributors. If you might be interested, send an email to death@contemporaryartmonth.com

Also, we'll have a pre-parade workshop day to work on costumes and instruments, on the Sunday before the parade.  For more information send an email to death@contemporaryartmonth.com

There's a lot happening around Blue Star tomorrow night -- including the official Contemporary Art Month opening event we mentioned below -- but the Southwest School of Art & Craft has also organized some must-see shows opening tomorrow. Historically, the Southwest School was as instrumental in birthing Contemporary Art Month as Blue Star, and this year's "Texas Draws I" exhibit will not disappoint, with artists such as Trenton Doyle Hancock, Jayne Lawrence, Eric Zimmerman... the list goes on.

Add to that Christine Olejniczak with Electric Dirt and Gregory Alan Johnson, and you've got some outstanding examples of contemporary Texas art. Don't let these exhibits pass you by!

We want to briefly mention the official opening and closing events for Contemporary Art Month this year. Our kick-off party is being hosted by Blue Star Contemporary Art Center, a gallery whose origin is closely intertwined with the origin of Contemporary Art Month, way back in 1986. On July 2 they're unveiling a show called "Lonely Are the Brave," curated by local artist Hills Snyder. Some of San Antonio's best artistic talent is in this show, including Jesse Amado, Justin Boyd, Kelly O'Connor, and Chris Sauter. They're also showing new work by Kevin Patrick McClellan, an architect and designer who founded the Architecture Bureau.

Then on July 31 we're going to wrap up a long, hot, dry month jam-packed with art at San Antonio's quintessential grassroots gallery, Sala Diaz. Enjoy some drinks on us, and take another look at Kristy Perez's "all that stands between us" (which opens on July 10).

So that's the beginning and the end. We'll get to the middle soon enough...

PS. The San Antonio Current just published the print calendar, so be sure to pick up a copy.