Finding Exhibitions & Curators

Starting out in a career as an artist can be confusing. There is no set script on how to go about setting up your own practice as an artist but I will try to give you some advice on the practical things to consider.

Finding funding and exhibition opportunities

When looking for funding and exhibition opportunities good place to start is with the opportunity listings on our website and sign up to receive our free email newsletter – the e-bulletin. The majority of galleries and spaces in the country advertise their calls for artists through us. Some may be the more established commercial galleries looking for high profile artists but many calls are from smaller galleries / spaces looking for emerging artists earlier in their career.

The information in the ebulletin can also be viewed on our website in the Jobs and Opportunities section: https://visualartists.ie/adverts/

You can sign up for the ebulletin online here:

https://visualartists.ie/contact/ebulletins

From here you can apply for exhibitions by responding to calls that seem relevant to your practice. We try to make the terms as clear as possible so we will say if there are any fees to apply or if there is a budget available to the selected artists.

Our Jobs and Opportunities listings also regularly have info on commissions, competitions, workshops and training, talks and seminars etc  – all directed towards visual artists at all stages of their career.

Have the basics to apply for exhibitions

It’s great that you’ve been in one exhibition, it will be good to build on that in the coming years by applying to open calls. 

When responding to open calls, the basic things you need to apply will be:

• Good quality images of your artworks
• An artists statement – a short description of your work and what it is about
• An artist CV – this can be short to begin with obviously and something you build with experience.

Don’t worry about your CV being small to begin with, that won’t go against you in a lot of the opportunities. The most important thing is to have good quality images of your work that accurately represents it, this is where most artists starting out fall down. You can take the images yourself, just be aware of the quality, sizing, cropping and it helps to provide some photos that give a sense of the scale of the work, for example showing the work in an exhibition. Another important thing is to have a concise and jargon free artist statement about your work, be direct and honest. There are tips on this in our How To Manual and we also run workshops on How to Photograph Your Work and Writing About Your Work, along with other professional development: https://visualartists.ie/professional-development-_/#!event-list

Building Relationships with Curators

Open calls are a great way to get exhibitions, another way is to build relationships with curators or galleries that suit your practice. 

There is no set quick way of attracting a curator, critics or other art professionals to shows or to see your work – be that in an exhibition space or a studio visit. For most artists getting reviews / critiques of their show is a result of building and nurturing relationships with art professionals over a long period of time.

A good way to research curators and galleries is to read the biographies of curators who took part in our annual event Get Together. As part of this event we have 40 curators available for one on one meetings so you can introduce your work to them.

Once you’ve identified some curators that would be a good fit for you, checked out their recent shows etc., you can try contacting them to arrange a studio visit or start building a relationship. This usually takes time but this is often how many artists get shows, by building these relationships with curators and bouncing ideas around.

In the initial contact with a curator you have not met, it is best not to directly ask for an exhibition or to send too much information in the first email. You want to make it as easy as possible for them to reply, if you send too much or ask too much, they need to look through what you have sent, give you explanations of how they normally work etc. If you make it clear that you have done your research on them it will take the “cold call” out of it and make it clear it is a direct email.

If you keep it simple and just send: 

• Only a couple of images and link to website/Instagram for more if they want it
• Explain why you are contacting them in particular eg: I’ve been following your work for a while, I saw XXX exhibition, I read your biography and feel your curatorial interests are aligned with my current work….
• Ask for feedback instead of exhibition – “…I have been developing a new project/series of works and I would really value your feedback on the direction my work is going in..”

Ideally you just want them to reply with “sure, no problem”. It then opens the door to building the relationship, showing them new work, maybe inviting them for a studio visit and letting them know when you have upcoming shows.

You can also contact our Help Desk with questions by phone on 01 6729488.  For the Northern Ireland office you can call 01 5824305.