Why Your Curatorial Applications May Be Falling Through

A curatorial application is your first opportunity to demonstrate your experience and way of thinking to your prospective employer. In a competitive field, even a strong application can be easily weakened by these 10 common mistakes: 

Preparing Your Application

1. Ignoring the guidelines. Do not forget to check essential information accompanying a job listing or an open call, including word count, deadline, required formats and eligibility criteria. 
2. Researching the opportunity superficially. Look beyond the organisation’s homepage and research its recent projects, audiences, mission and vision statements, social media and staff page. This approach can help you identify how you could contribute something specific. 

Make Your Experience Clear and Relevant

3. Sending the same application everywhere. While template statements can be useful, remember to tailor them and explain why the specific opportunity you’re applying for interests you. 
4. Repeating your CV. Your personal statement should interpret your experience, not replicate the chronological account of your experience from the CV. Focus on explaining how you think and work.
5. Making claims without evidence. While describing a quality or expertise you’ll bring to an organisation, accompany it by specific examples to support credibility. 

Avoid Ambiguity and Information Overload

6. Hiding behind curatorial jargon. While industry-specific terms demonstrate your expertise in a portfolio or academic writing, they are counterproductive in a job application. In this context, jargon obscures your ideas and experience.
7. Separating the idea from its delivery. When presenting a project proposal or concept, remember to show awareness of how it will come into being. Discuss the practical details (e.g. timeline, site, resources, budget) to demonstrate that your proposal can move from theory into practice. 
8. Dumping everything into your portfolio. Avoid overcluttering your portfolio and ensure that your project selection tells a coherent story. For more tips on how to create a curatorial portfolio, check our article How to Develop a Curatorial Portfolio.

Pay Attention to Details

9. Allowing small errors to undermine trust. Ensure that the organisation names, dates, document titles and captions are accurate and formatted consistently across your application.
10. Submitting at the last minute. Leave yourself enough time to double-check your application and requirements, and to account for unexpected events (e.g. WiFi not working) and to avoid time-zone confusion when applying for opportunities abroad.

Image: Odilon Redon, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Download the Resource: The Curatorial Application Check-Up

Are you a CFC Member? Download The Curatorial Application Check-Up below.