The Artist CV

The artist CV tells a reader at a glance whether you are the right fit for the job or exhibition. Will yours get you noticed?

prepare artist cv

For any job application, submission, or exhibition program, the working creative person must have a resume or a CV to present. The letters "CV" stand for "curriculum vitae" (sometimes only chosen a vita) which translates loosely to "course of life." The artist CV tells a reader at a glance what you lot accept done in the past, whether it includes previous exhibitions, employment, awards, etc., and lets them decide whether you are the right fit for the job/exhibition.

In curt, the CV is a single-page summary of your almost important experiences and accomplishments.

Often confused with a CV, a resume is a typical form that is used for job applications. Information technology explains your skills and experience, and the main focus is on personal qualifications, such as educational activity and work history. A CV, in contrast, is more of a record of accomplishments such as exhibitions, publications, and awards.

For most situations, a CV is best for an artist, equally it conforms to a format that lends itself well to displaying an exhibition history. For those unfamiliar with the artist's CV format, we're going to intermission downwards all of the data that you lot need and the best techniques for organizing your CV.

prepare artist cv

The ideal CV length is 1-two pages. If you've been working internationally for over 20 years, y'all can certainly push it to three, merely most galleries and competitions are really looking for ane-ii pages at most. Remember, the CV is a summary, non a biography. If you want info on how to write an creative person biography, nosotros've already written a guide for that.

As nosotros mentioned in our guide, you should keep everything consistent across the lath with your submissions. That includes font and way. If y'all bold sure items (like section heads) or italicize others (similar titles of shows), be sure to be consistent throughout the entire CV.

Many elements of your CV will be lists (of exhibitions, awards, publications), and it will exist tempting to bullet or number these lists. Do not utilize bullet points or numbers.These can be distracting and confusing and will pull attention abroad from the information that you are trying to convey.

Header

At the header of whatever CV should exist your contact information. Include your name, e-mail, website, phone number, and master address. Give your reader every option to contact you lot; the more than information, the better.

Your proper name should be the very first matter that any reviewer should run into, either centered or aligned to the left of the folio. You can adapt the type size to make it larger than the balance of your contact information. At a glance, your name is the first thing to pop out at people.

Contact information should follow on the adjacent line, aligned the aforementioned way that your name was aligned at the header. It can be smaller than your main text, to leave more room for your information.

ARTIST NAME
555-555-5555 | artist@website.com | www.artistwebsite.com | 123 Street Name

Teaching

If you have formal training as an artist, such as a BFA, MFA, or a design degree, be sure to list your instruction next on the page. People like to see what you studied, where, how long ago, and who your teachers were. If you went to a well-known or prestigious schoolhouse, this tin can often be a great highlight of the CV. These items look best in chronological order, with the most contempo at the top.

The education department should look like this:

EDUCATION:
Proper name of School — Degree Achieved — Year Achieved
Name of Other Schoolhouse –Caste Achieved— Year Achieved

Feel free to edit the styling, just brand sure that the information is articulate and readable.

If you are a self-taught creative person, you can skip this section. At that place is no do-or-die requirement for the data you demand to include in an artist CV, so you can go out off things you lot do non feel apply to you. On the other stop, you can add achievements that yous experience need their own category. Regardless, if you tin't fill a section fairly, don't include it. Having a blank header implies a lack of feel, even if you do have experience in other sections.

Exhibition History

[pullquote align="right" cite="" link="" color="" grade="" size=""]The ideal CV length is 1 to 2 pages.[/pullquote]

There are two ways to go about this section, and they both depend on the length of your exhibition history.

    1. If you have participated in fewer than 15 shows, include your unabridged exhibition history and label this department every bit "Exhibition History."
    2. If yous have more than 15 shows, include a selected exhibition list. Title this section "Selected Exhibition History."

The longer your career, the more than likely it is you'll want to include selected exhibitions, as besides much information volition bog downward your CV and lessen the bear on of each entry. That's why nosotros recommend 15-twenty shows as the maximum. When yous notice your CV filling upwardly with more than than 15-xx entries, parse it down to continue only the near notable galleries or shows.

Solo Shows:If you have more than than 5 solo exhibitions, then separate them into their own category. For fewer than 5 solo exhibitions, include them with the residuum of your exhibition history, but make certain to clearly label them equally solo shows.

For any organization mode, you lot must have this essential information for each exhibition entry:

  • Yr (always put your well-nigh recent exhibition start!)
  • Gallery/Show/Competition Name
  • Title of Evidence (looks best in quotation marks or italics)
  • City, State/City, State

Try to fit the data to one-2 lines on the folio. For case:

2018 – Agora Gallery "Name of Exhibition" New York City, NY. USA.

You can put the information in whatever club you think will make sense to your reader, but call back, it must be clear and consistent. A reader has to know when, what, and where your experiences happened, and the template above fills in all the blanks. The more information yous requite per entry, the easier it is for the reader to practise a search and find out more, only just continue your entries to one-2 lines max per testify.

Collections

Next upwards is a listing of institutions and collections in which your work is held. An institution would exist a museum or school. A public drove is a collection that is non necessarily a museum but can be viewed by the public, such as in a government part. This is opposed to a private collection, wherein the works are held past an individual buyer in their own habitation or private place of business organisation. If your work is displayed in a coffee shop in your town, that counts as a public drove.

The data yous should have for each entry is:

  • Proper name of Piece
  • Name of Collection/Establishment
  • Location (Urban center, State)
  • Year Acquired or Donated

[pullquote marshal="total" cite="" link="" color="" form="" size=""]Practice not use bullet points or numbers.These can exist distracting and confusing, and will pull attending away from the information that you are trying to convey.[/pullquote]

The entry can exist bundled like so:

Artwork Title. Public Art Museum. Cityville, United States. Donated 2015.

Publications

Following this section is a list of the publications that you lot've been featured in. This tin be whatsoever publication, large or small, but if you're only including a select few entries and then be sure to favor the "all-time looking" publications. Print media is still favored over the web for these kinds of things and will look better on your CV.

Just like your exhibitions, you lot'll want to list the almost recent publication at the acme, and the rest in reverse chronological society beneath.

Your entries should await something like this:

"Title of Commodity." Title of Publication. Volume number and publication appointment. Folio(southward) of article.

Awards

Next, yous can listing any awards you've won for your art or art-related piece of work. This can include any awards you may have earned from art history research, art teaching, or charitable outreach.

The format is like to publication entries.

Title of Award. Starting time/2d/3rd Place*. Awarding Organization. Year.

*Yous practice non need to include this if it is not applicable to the type of laurels you won.

Affiliations & Memberships

The final section will feature arts or arts-related organizations of which y'all are a fellow member. It can exist anything from an international group of artists to a small arts circle in your community.

You tin can easily list these entries similar so:

Member of the Following Organizations:
Fine art Group International, Joined 2012
Littletown Painting Circle, Founding Fellow member

Footer

At the very lesser will be your footer, in which you can include the name and information of any gallery/ies that you are represented by at the fourth dimension yous publish your CV. In typical footer-way, this looks nice centered and a few points smaller than the residual of the document.

Information technology should look something like this:

Electric current Representation: Gallery Proper noun, City, (State), Country. Website and/or telephone number.

That's the list for a CV, from caput to toe – or 'header' to 'footer,' more aptly. Remember that a curriculum vitae is a living document and should be updated with every new bear witness, new award or change in personal information. It's a great thought to have 1 "master list" that includes all of your information. So, you can skin it down when you lot need to ship it out.

Looking to heighten your career and build a presence in New York? Submit your portfolio to united states and get the opportunity to present your work to a broad range of national and international art collectors and buyers. Visit our Gallery Representation And Artist Promotion page for more than information.

We've attached a handy template that you can piece of work with to assist design your own CV. Become along and create!

How to write CV Template
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