MAJ Theme Man sitting on church steps New Orleans 1935 copy
Ben Shahn, Man Sitting on Church Steps, New Orleans, photograph, 1935 (photo: Wikimedia Commons).

 

Invitation and Theme – Winter 2026: Words and Images

Words and images communicate in different ways. Their association can yield myriad types of relationships: they can collaborate in harmonious ways, enter in exploratory dialogues, or even disagree and clash. After all, a visual and a verbal discourse are fundamentally different. Writers have qualified the interactions between words and images as a dance, a struggle, or even a border skirmish.

 

 

MAJ Theme Jenny Holzer Guggenheim copy

Jenny Holzer, Light Line, Guggenheim Museum, New York, 2024 (photo: Wikimedia Commons).

We are curious to see how you integrate words and letterforms into your art and to read about your motivations for using verbal elements in works of visual art.

What do each of these types of discourse mean for you and what do you seek to achieve by combining them?

Do you think that the presence of words enhances the efficacy of an image? Or if it is true that an image is worth a thousand words? Are words indispensable to successfully convey a specific message? (The combination of text and image in political placards and banners comes to mind.)

With the ubiquitous presence of graphic design in our daily lives, how do you navigate the boundaries between artistic expression and the association of text with images for utilitarian, commercial, or propagandistic purposes?

Do letterforms inspire your visual vocabulary? Do you use shapes that are calligraphic or typographic in nature and that allude to a verbal language without being decipherable? What is your motivation for doing so?

MAJ Theme Fabulous 5 piece copy

Mural by Lee Quiñones and Fab 5 Freddy, Washington, D.C., 1982 (photo: Véronique Plesch).

Deadline: 1 December 2025.

Guidelines for UMVA Members’ Showcase:

We invite MAJ member artists to participate in the Showcase (to become a member, click here).

  • For the Words and Images issue, submit up to four JPEG or png images (NO TIFF files), approximately 2500 pixels on longest side, resolution 72dpi.
  • Label each image file as follows: your last name_Number of Image_Title (with no spaces in the title). Please DO NOT put whole caption/credit in image file label, see image list/caption format below (if you are submitting for a group put your own last name in first).
  • Include a numbered image list at the end of your statement or brief essay (600 words or less) in Word doc. format, NOT a PDF.
  • Image list/caption format: create a list that is numbered to match the number in your image file label that includes the following in this order: Artist’s Name, Title of Work, medium, size (example: 9 x 12 in.), date (optional), photo credit (example: photo: Ansel Adams) if not included we assume it is courtesy of the artist. Example: Unknown Artist, Untitled, oil on canvas, 9 x 12 in., 2000 (photo: Ansel Adams).
  • Label your document file names: Last Name_Title.
  • Please wait until all of your material is compiled to submit.

Put “Words and Images” in the subject line and submit by email to umvalistings@gmail.com by the 1 December 2025 deadline. MAJ will limit the Members’ Showcase section to UMVA members who have not been published in the past year.

Do not send preformatted visual essays. Our editors will lay out text and images submitted using the guidelines above.

It is the MAJ’s policy to request and publish image credits. We will not publish images for which the contributor does not have the right to publish. However, it is to be assumed that any uncredited or unlabeled images are contributing artists’ own images. By submitting to the MAJ, you are acknowledging respect for these policies.

MAJ Theme Still Life with Checked Tablecloth Juan Gris 1915 copy

Juan Gris, Nature morte à la nappe à carreaux (Still Life with Checkered Tablecloth), March 1915, oil on canvas, 45.8 x 35.1 in. (116.5 x 89.3 cm). Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (photo: Wikimedia Commons).