Seeking Curator

The University Gallery at NYU Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) is a non-collecting academic museum. Its exhibition program prioritizes curatorial, scholarly, and artistic experimentation, supporting publications and projects of local relevance and international significance. The program connects research and knowledge production, the region and NYUAD’s academic community.

The NYUAD Art Gallery seeks a curator to play a lead role in realizing its mission. The Curator conducts research and develops museum exhibitions that contribute to art historical interpretation and knowledge production. The Curator will also play a key role in generating outreach strategies, connecting into the university curriculum and out to the greater public, activating the exhibition content through programming, such as symposia, residencies, tours, and workshops. The Curator reports to the Chief Curator and Executive Director of the NYUAD Art Galleries.

Key responsibilities
Curate a major exhibition every other year, collaborate with with the Chief Curator and faculty and external guest curators on exhibition development, conduct research, and develop relationships for future exhibitions, write, publish, and present in public forums related to above areas of research.

As a senior member of the gallery team, the Curator is responsible for representing the gallery mission to various communities and in the public eye. The Curator will be responsible for helping draw out the content of exhibitions through programming around all exhibitions, whether guest-curated or generated in-house. This should include creative strategies for engaging different audiences, such as: artist and curator meetings/content development with faculty, student engagement, developing symposia, conferences, residencies, connecting to schools and community groups (in collaboration with the education department), developing series of public talks and events for different regional publics, including adult, family, Arabic-language, scholarly, and other.

The Curator will represent the NYUAD Gallery in the communities it serves (attend regional and international events and Campus internal events) to develop relationships that enable synergies and growth among our varied constituents.

Campus Art Collection: Research and develop curatorial texts for NYUAD’s budding campus-wide collection, advise, together with the Chief Curator, on acquisition strategies, oversee site-specific commissions to come.

Essential requirements:
-An advanced degree in Art History or related field
-Six years of relevant experience (or combination of graduate education and experience)
-At least one major exhibition curated, critically reviewed
-Sophisticated understanding of art, art history, art collections
-Demonstrated understanding of museum standards of production
-Excellent written and verbal communication skills; highly organized and capable of managing multiple tasks; creative and highly detail-oriented; demonstrated ability to interact with multiple constituencies, including internal and external to NYU and NYUAD

Desirable background:
-Knowledge of the MENASA region or related topics
-International Modern or Contemporary specialization
-Fluent written and spoken Arabic, or other language from the Middle East, North Africa, or South Asia

About the Art Gallery at NYUAD
The NYU Abu Dhabi Art Gallery presents curated exhibitions of art and culture across historical and contemporary topics, with a special emphasis on subjects of both regional concern and international significance. Its curatorial platform supports scholarly and experimental installations, artists’ projects, guest curators, and landmark exhibitions. Details of the exhibition program can be found here.

About NYUAD
NYU Abu Dhabi is a degree-granting research university with a fully integrated liberal arts and science undergraduate program in the Arts, Sciences, Social Sciences, Humanities, and Engineering. NYU Abu Dhabi, NYU New York, and NYU Shanghai, form the backbone of NYU’s global network university, an interconnected network of portal campuses and academic centers across six continents that enable seamless international mobility of students and faculty in their pursuit of academic and scholarly activity. This global university represents a transformative shift in higher education, one in which the intellectual and creative endeavors of academia are shaped and examined through an international and multicultural perspective. As a major intellectual hub at the crossroads of the Arab world, NYUAD serves as a center for scholarly thought, advanced research, knowledge creation, and sharing, through its academic, research, and creative activities.

Please include a CV, cover letter, exhibition history, and writing sample in an application through this link: Apply for this position