Graduation is daunting, there’s no doubt about it. The Arts world can be a minefield, far too often you’re expected to work endless hours in unpaid internships, grateful for even the tiniest opportunity. James Clegg, an experienced curator at Talbot Rice Gallery, was eager to help demystify the industry and advise students worried about their future job prospects. He offered hugely valuable advice and practical examples of his curatorial work in the current, fascinating exhibition—The Children are Now.
Having been at Talbot Rice Gallery for the last 15 years, James explained how his career began doing an Undergraduate degree in Design and Applied Arts, and later an MSC in Contemporary Art and Art Theory. After studying he got a job in the Fruitmarket Gallery as a Front of House Assistant, which enabled him to build important skills, including being able to talk about art to visitors. He spoke about not having a specific career in mind at this time but focusing on and working hard at what he enjoyed. Eager to be an Art Critic, James started building a portfolio of writing skills through short articles at lowly-paid magazines, developing skills that subsequently enabled him to write for the Art Review and Art Monthly. In a similar way, his first job at Talbot Rice Gallery was an Exhibitions Assistant, from which he worked his way up to now having a major role as a curator.
James impressed upon me both through his experiences and his advice, the importance of developing the skills for what you want to do before you have the job. He explained to become a curator one day, something you can do for free is try and make a hypothetical exhibition. He suggesting choosing a gallery, looking at its map and trying to plan out what you would do if you were the curator. What would you put in each space? What would be the cost, and would this be realistic? What kind of theme would you have and how would you contact artists? Would your idea be original? Spreading this idea to other areas, James said: “If you want to be an art critic start a blog.” This idea of practicing important parts of the job (such as setting yourself deadlines, bringing together ideas, and learning how to write professional emails) is amazing advice and something any of us could do.
Overall, James advocates for people to test out real skills they will need for their future careers in imaginary projects. Hearing such an accomplished professional break down how he progressed in each part of his career, explaining how he developed the required skills so that once he was in the position to apply for jobs he had built up the necessary experience, was enlightening. Hopefully James’s helpful careers advice will help you feel slightly better about navigating the art industry, and give you a starting point to identify and practice the skills you might need.
Photo by Kate Fowle for The Student