Curator Fellowship

With funding from the Volkswagen Foundation’s Lower Saxony “Vorab” programme, the HBK Braunschweig is offering a one-year curatorial scholarship. The project, which will initially be temporary, will serve to experiment with and test this funding format and, if necessary, to prepare for making it permanent. The newly established curator scholarship at the HBK is intended to complement the existing Dorothea-Erxleben and Braunschweig Projects scholarship programmes and at the same time strengthen the new and already established activities of curatorial practice at the university.

Application deadline is 30 August 2023 (e-mail must be received by 11:59 PM CEST)

Braunschweig University of Art (HBK) is an internationally orientated, academic university of the arts with the right to award doctoral and post-doctoral degrees. With around 1,000 students in the fields of fine arts, art education, performing arts, design, visual communication, art history and media studies, HBK is one of the largest art colleges in Germany.

1. HBK is awarding a one-year Curator Fellowship with a start date of 1 April 2024.
2. The goal of this fellowship is to intensify cooperation between HBK and the museums and art institutions in the local area and more broadly throughout Lower Saxony. The successful candidate is expected to work with a museum or other art institution in Lower Saxony to conceptualise an exhibition project of his/her own and perform the full calculations for this project, engage in professional internal and external communications, prepare for the project and realise it if at all possible and then make it public through a campaign encompassing outreach and public relations.
   This is a completely new format for HBK, so the successful candidate will have a wealth of room to explore his/her own ideas and approaches in coordination with the university administration. He/she will also be able to tap into the university’s own attractive network. Close cooperation with and a connection to the work of HBK instructors and, especially, students is a plus. The fellowship is to conclude with a brief final report on the activities undertaken, which should also contain information from the recipient’s perspective on how to design the fellowship optimally if it is to continue in the future.
3. The successful candidate is also expected to enrich curatorial practice at HBK by cooperating with recipients of artistic grants and fellowships from Braunschweig Projects and preparing for their final exhibition from a curatorial standpoint. He/she will therefore participate in the meetings of the jury selecting recipients of funding from Braunschweig Projects.
4. To receive funding, the candidate must have prior curatorial experience in Germany and abroad. His/her project proposal must also suggest that it will make an important contribution to raising the profile of the collaborative relationship between HBK and a museum or other art institution in Lower Saxony.
5. Funding will be provided in the form of scholarships of 1,250 euros per month over a period of 12 months. A fully equipped workplace at the university is available. A project cost grant of up to 4,000 euros will be provided to support exhibition activities. There is a travel budget of 2,000 euros. The funding period begins on 1 April 2024. Housing in Braunschweig cannot be provided.
6. Presence on site and involvement in the activities of HBK are desired. The successful candidate will also be given the opportunity to advance his/her teaching skills as part of a teaching position (with separate compensation) and to work with instructors and students from HBK.
7. Applications should be submitted using the application form, with a specific reference to the fellowship being applied for, to the following e-mail no later than 30 August 2023: kuratieren-stipendium@hbk-bs.de  (e-mail must be received by 11:59 PM CEST; applications received after this will not be considered).
8. The decision regarding awarding the Curator Fellowship will be made by the Office of the President of HBK based on the recommendation of a specialist jury, with special consideration for the opportunity for developing the curatorial collaboration between HBK and a museum or art institution in Lower Saxony.