‘The Fifth Curator’
BRITISH COUNCIL INTERNATIONAL CURATORIAL COMPETITION IN PARTNERSHIP WITH THE WHITECHAPEL GALLERY
The Fifth Curator competition is an opportunity for an aspiring curator from a non-UK background to work with the British Council Collection. We are seeking new views and fresh perspectives on our Collection for an exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery, London in April 2010.
The Fifth Curator competition launches 5 April 2009. Aspiring curators from outside the United Kingdom are invited to download the forms and guidelines here and to use the new British Council Collection website as a resource to create their proposals. In November 2009, six short-listed applicants will be invited to London to take part in a week of professional development with the Visual Arts Department at the end of which a winning proposal will be selected by a panel of senior art world figures.
The Fifth Curator exhibition will be the fifth and final exhibition in a series showcasing the British Council Collection of Art in The Collections Gallery (Gallery 7) at the newly refurbished Whitechapel in East London. Organised by Visual Arts Department of the British Council, each exhibition is selected by an external advisor.
Artist Michael Craig-Martin selected the first exhibition Passports - Great Early Buys from the British Council Collection, focusing on some of the most prescient acquisitions in the Collection’s long history. This will be followed over the course of the next year by exhibitions from the Collection selected by artists Jeremy Deller and Alan Kane; Nicholas Penny (Director of the National Gallery); and the artist Paula Rego.
The Fifth Curator winning proposal will be realised at the Whitechapel Gallery in April 2010; we hope this will be the beginning of a longer term programme to engage aspiring curatorial talent with one of Britain’s finest collections of British Art.
