What can we collectively demand of institutions? 

(preliminary guidelines for institutions that care)

Transparency 

• Transparency about funding and budgeting: how can money be spent for a given project? What was the salary of the last person who held the position you’re offering?

• Make open-calls truly open: hold an open meeting/gathering, make selection criteria and quotas transparent for more equitable selection

Artist Support 

• If an event is cancelled beyond participant’s control, pay a cancellation fee of at least 60 percent

• Support artists’ visa process 

• Provide a travel budget and per diem for living lots 

• Establish infrastructures and well-being budgets for therapy, body-care etc. when requiring art workers to mediate traumatic subjects and violent works

• Ask if an artist requires childcare, provide this if they do

• Support emerging artists to meet with more experienced ones

• The institution should take financial responsibility for materials, space, transportation

Agency 

• Allow artists to maintain control of how their work is presented, consult with them about the context in which their work is shown

• Against censorship, do not remove an artwork without public conversation and artist’s agreement  

Accountability & Respect

• Keep healthy boundaries on working hours, set realistic time-management expectations

• When asking for artist’s proposals, provide funds to develop ideas in the first place 

• Allocate funds for community engagement

• Allow more open space for non-formal artists 

• Artists should have the option to stop working with the institution if agreed upon budgeting or timing proves unrealistic

• Break the stipend logic: pay artists a living wage for their work

• Make sure that people who are not chosen for competitions get something out of the process: skillshare, networking, access to institutional resources

How can we organize ourselves OUTSIDE of institutions?

invest in our own communication infrastructures:

• set up online list-serves, telephone chat groups, and most importantly: 

• make IRL space for inclusive conversations 

work towards art-workers’ union-structure: 

• work towards working alliances that acknowledge common exploitation,  attend to common needs and make collective demands

• bring others up with you, include more art-workers in your process

pass on opportunities to peers if you’re unable to take them: 

• name alternatives

informal structures have their limits: 

• we need recognized rights and right to sanction institution 

• knowledge about our rights

How can we organize ourselves WITHIN institutions?

Pre-care guidelines for freelance artists entering into work with institutions 

Take the steps necessary to define your own value systems:

• Abolish internalized gatekeepers of the “artist” profession → actively work against this elitist agenda

• Relinquish values of self-worth that may be tied to exclusivity → you can bring others up with you, you don’t need to do this work alone 

• Insist on the boundary/separation of business and personal relationship when an associate invites you into institutional work (no exploitation of “friendship”)

• Set your own expectations for appearing as an artist representative: 

“In order to agree to be on a panel, I need…_____” (consider community access needs in addition to your own)

You may ask: 

• Why have I been invited? Who else will be on this panel with me? To avoid tokenism, is there more than one “representative?” 

• Are there diverse perspectives? Who is invited? Who is not invited?

• Is there a local representative? Paying respect to the local context 

• Is the conversation accessible? Is there barrier free entry (ramps,) sign language interpretation, free tickets for low-income attendees 

Prepare yourself to communicate in (y)our best interest:

• Play out negotiation conversations with a friend or trusted colleague 

• Ask an elder or a mentor to support you in your negotiation process. They may act as your second pair of eyes, your agent, your assistant, whatever title you need to give them to support you in an unfamiliar context. Bring 3rd party agent/assistance to take notes, supervise negotiations 

• Consult the institution’s references: Ask people who have worked for this institution before about their experience

• Before agreeing to work with an institution, ask the following questions (be willing and ready to lose work or walk away if values aren’t aligned):

Why am I right for this position?

Who will be hired if not me?

Are you prepared to give me a contract?

How are you profiting from my work?

How will I be paid? What is the pay schedule?

Navigating the Institution

We recognize there are differences in how we can navigate the process of working with an institution as someone on payroll vs. a freelancer. We need ongoing research to define our distinct vulnerabilities. 

Vulnerabilities on payroll

• working within entrenched power hierarchies of the institution, it may prove more difficult to be heard

• less flexibility to negotiate terms of working environment once your contract is signed 

• If you’re fired, may lose health insurance that you and your family depend on

• tight schedule, less opportunity to organize outside of the workplace

Vulnerabilities as freelancer  

• less job security, must rely on your reputation for future work 

• less potential peer support in new and unfamiliar contexts 

Whether an employee or a freelance art worker, either way, in order to navigate the institution, you need to map your own value systems first: What is it you care about? What do you need to feel supported to enter working relations with others? How do you build and keep trusting working relations?

Guidelines for art workers employed by institutions 

• The infrastructures we enter are not caring infrastructures → expect to build new processes of accountability and peer-support 

• Do your own research (call former employees and ask about their experiences)

• Create formalized alliances with your co-workers →  be in solidarity within uncaring structures

• Trusted co-workers can be co-mentors and comrades: CC them on your emails, bring them to your meetings, they are your accountability partners, your second pair of eyes

• synchronize collective actions and demands based on shared interests, not personal relationships

• Insist that representation does matter in meeting groups, working groups, commissions, juries etc. 

• Learn the financial structures and mechanisms within the system: e.g. what kind of money goes where? How do artists get paid?

• Your invitation is powerful: invite art workers and artists that are not regulars or residents 

• Find ways to include unemployed and freelance art workers in your struggle to enact institutional change