About the opportunity
We are excited to announce the call for proposals to participate in Platform: 2024 – Edinburgh Art Festival’s Early Career Artist Award. This annual group exhibition is designed to provide a dedicated platform for early-career artists based in Scotland and working in the field of contemporary art within Edinburgh Art Festival’s programme.
Platform has supported 32 early career artists to produce and exhibit work as part of the Edinburgh Art Festival programme since 2015. You can watch a video and find out more about the 2023 edition of Platform here.
Selected artists will receive:
- £1,500 artist fee
- £1,500 to produce your work
- £500 mentoring support
Who we are
Edinburgh Art Festival is the UK’s largest annual festival of visual art. Founded in 2004, we work with local and international partners to present an ambitious and meaningful programme of exhibitions, events and projects across the city.
Since its beginnings, the festival has featured exhibitions including international and UK artists at a pivotal point in their career alongside the best emerging talent, major survey exhibitions of historic figures, and a programme of newly commissioned artworks that respond to historic sites in the city.
The festival’s year-round community engagement programme has long-term relationships and partnerships across the city, creating relevant and memorable experiences with artists. We invite local people to explore culture, community, the city and self-expression, and value, with many festival commissions reflecting this unique creative relationship.
Who You Are
We are looking to support early career artists who can demonstrate an independent creative practice. Applicants must be based in Scotland and have been living or working in Scotland for at least 2 years.
Work in any medium will be considered, and we welcome collaborative proposals, but the limitations to the fee and budget offered should be taken into consideration.We understand that the term early-career is slippery and can depend on a range of factors such as access routes to the arts, career breaks and personal circumstances. The definition of early career that we will be working with for the purposes of this exhibition are:
- You must be able to demonstrate a commitment to your practice in your CV over at least four years. This includes but is not limited to studio membership, residencies, exhibitions, workshops etc.
- You will not yet have had a solo presentation within a public institution or are represented by a commercial gallery.
- You may have graduated from a Bachelor’s Degree within the period 2012–2023. Current students including those completing postgraduate courses will not be eligible.
- If you have not followed a formal education route, your CV must show that you have developed an independent contemporary art practice over at least 4 and a maximum of 10 years.
- If you do not meet the criteria of graduating between 2012 – 2023 due to personal circumstances such as parental leave, health reasons, caring responsibilities, or other work commitments – please provide a short statement (max 300 words) that shows how you meet the early career criteria.
How to Apply
Applications have now closed.
Selection Process
Submissions will be reviewed by the panel, including invited independent selectors Amal Khalaf and Eliel Jones, alongside our Curator Eleanor Edmondson. The panel will select artists on the basis of their eligibility and the individual quality of their proposals, as well as with a view to forming a cohesive collective presentation.
The selection panel can only assess applications on the basis of material submitted. It is therefore essential, and in your interest, to supply the highest quality visuals possible that fully represent your work.
Please be aware that while a website portfolio can provide good supporting documentation, the dedicated images or links to specific material for your project requested in the form will be the key materials reviewed by the panel.
Amal Khalaf is a curator and artist and currently Director of Programmes at Cubitt and Civic Curator at the Serpentine Galleries. Here and in other contexts she has developed residencies, exhibitions and collaborative research projects at the intersection of art and social justice, recently launching Support Structures for Support Structures, a fellowship and grant programme for artists working in the field of community practice and spatial politics. With an interest in radical pedagogy, collectivity and community practice, she has been part of developing a migrant justice programme through Implicated Theatre (2011-2019) using Theatre of the Oppressed methodologies to create interventions, curricula and performances with ESOL teachers, hotel workers, domestic workers and migrant justice organisers. She is a founding member of artist collective GCC and is also a trustee for film cooperative not/nowhere- London, Art Night-UK and Mophradat-Athens.
Eliel Jones is the Curator of Performance and Time-based Media at KANAL – Centre Pompidou, a new interdisciplinary museum of modern and contemporary art due to open in Brussels in 2025. His research interests and methodologies stem from intersectional approaches to queer and feminist discourse and are guided by his involvement in direct community action and solidarity. Prior to KANAL he was the Curator of the 2nd Brent Biennial, London’s only biennial taking place in the North West Borough of Brent. He has also held curatorial positions at Metroland Cultures, Cell Project Space and Chisenhale Gallery (all in London), where he worked towards realising multidisciplinary commissions by emerging artists and setting up infrastructures of support for artists and young people. Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic he curated Queer Correspondence, a mail-art initiative that reached nearly 1000 subscribers in 42 countries through monthly letter-sized commissioned projects by artists and writers. Jones has curated other independent projects in the UK and abroad and is a regular writer for various publications. He is currently a faculty member of the Curatorial Studies postgraduate programme at KASK in Gent, a Trustee at PEER, and a Committee Member for the LUX Moving Image Collection.
Get In Touch
We know that there are many barriers for people applying for opportunities, especially in the cultural sector, and we want to make this process as open and supportive as possible. If you would like to talk through the aspects of the opportunity, the application process, require support with submitting your application or would like a paper copy of the form sent to you, please contact us:
Phone number: 0131 226 6558 Email: [email protected]
Please note any proposals received after the deadline of Midnight Sunday 4 February 2024 will not be considered.
Links
Web link to online application form, opens in new tab: Platform 2024 online application
Web link to paper application form, downloads in Microsoft Word: Platform 2024 paper application form
Web link to budget template, downloads in Microsoft Excel: Platform 2024 budget template
Web link to examples of access document from Access Docs for Artists, opens in new tab: https://www.accessdocsforartists.com/examples
Web link to equal opportunities form in Microsoft Forms, opens in new tab: