Curatorial Assistant

This open call is an invitation to cultural producers based in the Greater Vancouver area, seeking to build experience in exhibition and event production. The Curatorial Assistant will support the curator/director, the Engagement Producer, and participating artists and community partners in various aspects of exhibition and public programme production. The Curatorial Assistant will assist in research, writing, and exhibition coordination over summer 2027, as well as delivery of a contemporary art exhibition and public programme, presented in Vancouver, British Columbia, through autumn 2027. What is the project? The proliferation of Artificial Intelligence systems throughout our communities, workplaces, and private spaces are driving profound changes in culture, thought, labour, and our relationships with one another. Within territories throughout the imperial core, many of us are seeing these changes manifested through increasing job insecurity, displacement of vulnerable and precarious urban populations, and concerns around resource consumption. While acknowledging the urgency of the issues mentioned above, this project seeks to explore the cognitive, epistemological, socio-political, and colonial shifts that tech companies are driving by pushing to integrate AI and algorithmic dependence throughout our societies. This project invites artists to create a new body of artwork that questions and explores what is at stake for our species and our world amid accelerating shifts toward ever more digital futures. Themes this project could explore include: Machine learning as a new era of enclosure, and primitive accumulation; AI systems, their infrastructure and resource consumption as new forms and frontiers of colonialism; AI proliferation as a process narrowing and homogenising thought, language, and imagination; Machine learning and exaggeration or reinforcement of archival, historical, and cultural biases; Mass forgetting, de-skilling, and digital dependence; Undermining democracy and access to information; Erasure of traditional practices and crafts; erasure of marginal and minority languages and epistemologies; Speculative imaginaries of what fair, equitable AI and automation could look like if utilised to benefit humans and the environment; Speculative imaginaries of futures without AI; Using contemporary art to preserve/revive traditional and craft practices, marginalised/minoritised languages and epistemologies. The role As this project’s Curatorial Assistant, you will support all stakeholders (curator/director, Engagement team, artists, community partners, hosting venue) on the production-side of the project. Your primary responsibilities will include, but are not limited to: Co-develop the final exhibition concept alongside artists and the production team; Assist in conceptual research and writing; Assist in developing interpretive texts; Support the curator/director with general production duties, including artist liaison, sourcing installation materials, coordinating deliveries, installation and deinstallation, social media and marketing; Occasionally support the Engagement Producer with events-related duties, including event/workshop logistics and delivery, social media and marketing;