IMPAKT invites emerging and aspiring curators with a specific interest in media art and its relationship to technology and society to apply for the Full Spectrum Curatorship Programme. The lecturers for the upcoming programme, which starts in October, are:

• Ade Darmawan (curator and the director of Ruangrupa, a contemporary art collective based in Jakarta. Together with Ruangrupa, he co-curated TRANSaction: Sonsbeek 2016. With Ruangrupa he is also appointed as the artistic director of Documenta 15 in Kassel 2022);
• Paulien Dresscher (independent researcher, curator and advisor. Curator of the Interactive programme of the Dutch Film Festival and of Into the Great Wide Open, formerly curating for Cinekid);
• Katerina Gregos (curator, writer and lecturer. Chief curator of the 1st Riga Biennial 2018 and curator at the Schwarz Foundation, Munich/Athens. In 2011 she curated the critically acclaimed exhibition for the Danish Pavilion at the 54th Venice Biennial);
• Bart Rutten (artistic director of the Centraal Museum Utrecht. He was previously the head of collections at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam and the Netherlands Media Art Institute);
• Angelique Spaninks (director and curator at MU Hybrid Art House, Eindhoven. She was director and artistic manager at STRP Festival from 2012 to 2018 and international curator for the 6th Guangzhou Triennial in 2018);
• Florian Wüst (independent film curator, has been working for transmediale, Impakt, Werkleitz and many other international festivals and venues).

Full Spectrum Curatorship is a new programme that aims to bridge the gap between theoretical knowledge and the practical and substantive aspects of curation in the field of media art and contemporary arts dealing with digital technologies and online environments. IMPAKT, as the oldest media art festival in the Netherlands, offers recent graduates and curators at the beginning of their career the opportunity to develop their own curatorial programme under expert guidance. IMPAKT’s extensive archive and critical contemporary programming will be complemented by the experience of internationally recognised curators and exchanges with renowned media art institutions. In the framework of this training programme, history, theory, contextualisation, organisation, and execution of media art related programmes will be discussed. The programme covers a.o. how works relate to each other, the chosen subject and societal themes; how to involve the artists in the creation of the programme, and ways of communicating the outcome to the public. The focus will be on time-based media, as such there will be specific attention to its aspects: technological and logistical character, challenges and possibilities of multi-channel and interactive formats, presentation formats, perception of the public etc.

Half of the programme consists of lectures by international curators discussing their practice, the other half will be feedback on your curatorial proposals and discussions with other participants of the programme. In the end, the created programmes will be presented in the form of a spatial exhibition, panel discussion, screening, online presentation, or other formats.

The Full Spectrum Curatorship programme will start in September and finish in December, with meetings online on a bi-weekly basis. Since this is the pilot version and first edition of the programme, we offer the programme for a reduced fee of €100. For this fee participants get talks, feedback sessions, and the final presentation. Recent graduates and upcoming curators are welcome to apply. Talented students can also apply but it is not possible to receive ECTS. To apply please send an up to date CV (max. 1 page) and answer the questions regarding your motivation. The application should also include a brief proposal for one or more subjects to be explored over the course of the programme (max. 1 page in total). Young interested curators can apply until the 1st of September 23:59h by filling out THIS form. 

Depending on the conditions of COVID-19 and possible other circumstances, Full Spectrum Curatorship will be offered either as a hybrid of online and offline meetings or as a fully online training programme. In any case the programme can be followed entirely by online participation. All meetings will be held in English. 

The list of involved lecturers is still in progress and will be announced soon, for updates please check our website.