Exhibition Curator, European Media Art Festival (EMAF)
For the upcoming 40th edition of the festival, we are looking for a curator for the EMAF exhibition, which will take place at Kunsthalle Osnabrück from 21 April – 23 May 2027.
Period of work: October 2026 – May 2027
Application deadline: 4 September 2026
EMAF is regarded internationally as one of the most important forums for media art. Consisting of an exhibition, film programmes, talks, workshops and performative formats, the festival links contemporary artistic practices with social discourses. Guest-curated projects and retrospectives also offer an in-depth look at historical positions and contexts.
The EMAF exhibition opens along with the five-day festival. This group exhibition features current works of media art and is curated in line with the festival’s annual theme.
EMAF’s 2027 theme focuses on the archive as an instrument for the production of knowledge, as a site of critical intervention and as a space for imagining alternative futures. Taking these ideas as a starting point, the curator will both develop a conceptual framework for the exhibition and be responsible for its implementation.
We are seeking a curator with at least five years of experience in curating and producing media art exhibitions or comparable projects.
The key tasks here include:
Developing a conceptual framework for the exhibition and selecting the pieces to be included in it
Reviewing submissions received via the open call and independently researching other possible works for the exhibition
Planning and producing the exhibition in collaboration with the festival management and the on-site technical team
Managing the budget and assisting with the acquisition of third-party funding
Writing the necessary texts and sourcing/researching images for the festival publications and press materials
Training exhibition guides and supervisors
The curator is required to be in Osnabrück both during the festival and installation/ deinstallation periods, but may otherwise work remotely.
Excellent German and English language skills are essential.
We offer:
A flat fee of €10,000 (plus VAT)
Travel and accommodation expenses during the festival and the installation/ deinstallation periods
The opportunity to collaborate with an international curatorial team
Flexible working hours
We expect applicants to respect the dignity and safety of all individuals, to ensure that everyone is treated equally and to take a firm stand against sexual harassment and discrimination of any kind.
We welcome all applications—regardless of gender, nationality, ethnic and social background, religion/beliefs, disability, age, or sexual orientation and identity.
We look forward to receiving a detailed CV and a portfolio including work samples by 4 September 2026 at the following email address: bewerbung@emaf.de.
Please contact Katrin Mundt at kmundt@emaf.de with any questions you might have.
ABOUT EMAF
The European Media Art Festival Osnabrück (EMAF) has its origin in a workshop for experimental films at the Department of Media Studies at the University of Osnabrück. This resulted in a film meeting in 1981: the so-called “Experimental Film Workshop”, and the foundation of the association of the same name, which is still the sponsor of the EMAF today. In 1988, the “Film and Television Year” proclaimed by the EU offered the opportunity to put the festival on a new footing. The team of students put together a new concept for this - under the title “European Media Art Festival”.
Today, EMAF is regarded internationally as one of the most influential forums for contemporary media art. Each year it offers its visitors an overview of current artistic productions in film programmes, exhibitions, performances and hybrid formats. Guest-curated projects and retrospectives provide in-depth insights into historical positions and contexts.
At the heart of the festival is the annually changing theme, which in the exhibition, in specially curated film programmes and talks by theorists from various disciplines, illuminates the interfaces between artistic practice, technological development and social reality. The main themes of the last few years have included documentary working methods in art (2018: Report. Notizen aus der Wirklichkeit /i.e. Report. Notes from Reality), the relationship between language and transgression (2019: Wild Grammar), the entanglements of I and We (2020: First Person Plural), the multiple relationships between possession and being possessed (2021: Possessed), our entanglement in the world of things (2022: The Thing is), an understanding of time and history that is becoming increasingly questionable (2023: Trembling Time), the role that sensory perception plays regarding the human and non-human experience of the world (2024: Feelers, Sensors) and the role of witnesses today, how testimonies shape our view of the world and how they can influence political reality (2025: Witnessing Witnessing).
In its Campus section, EMAF offers selected German and European art academies a forum. In exhibitions and film screenings, they present current works or develop projects through which they respond to local conditions or thematic impulses. The festival identifies as a place of experimentation, where extraordinary works are created and actors from different fields can enter into dialogue with each other. Each year, around 12.000 international artists, curators, researchers, students and film and art lovers meet at EMAF.
The festival identifies as a place of experimentation, where extraordinary works are created and actors from different fields can enter into dialogue with each other. Each year, international artists, curators, researchers, students and film and art lovers meet at EMAF.