Antwerp, Belgium, October 1, 2015 - October 1, 2019
Application deadline: Jun 30, 2015

PhD Position in Curatorial Research
Art Against the Grain of “Collective Sisyphus:” The Case of Allan
Sekula’s Ship of Fools / The Dockers’ Museum (2010-2013)

The University of Leuven (KU Leuven, Lieven Gevaert Research Centre for
Photography) and Museum voor Hedendaagse Kunst Antwerpen (M HKA) search
to employ a PhD-candidate (full time / 2 (+2) years appointment,
2015-2019). The research will be conducted under the supervision of
Prof. dr. Hilde Van Gelder (KU Leuven), dr. Mieke Bleyen (KU Leuven),
and dr. Edwin Carels (M HKA).

The position is available within the framework of a research project
entitled ‘Art Against the Grain of “Collective Sisyphus:” The Case of
Allan Sekula’s Ship of Fools / The Dockers’ Museum (2010-2013).’ Funded
by KU Leuven and FWO (Research Foundation–Flanders), and hosted by KU
Leuven and M HKA, it centers on a concrete case study: Ship of Fools /
The Dockers’ Museum by the US artist, theoretician, critic, teacher and
poet Allan Sekula (1951-2013). Sekula produced this unfinished,
multifaceted and variably installable artwork, containing around two
thousand objects, at the very end of his life. Its overarching theme is
“dead labor.” With this notion, Sekula hints at collective efforts of
human labor irretrievably lost in history. In his view, joint forces of
past generations still have not sufficiently led to constructing real
civil alliances among people, such as an international imposition of
fair labor conditions. The project asks how Sekula’s last work,
recently acquired by M HKA, aims to go “against the grain” of this
“collective Sisyphus” by imagining possible forms of human solidarity
in a globalized economy confronted to an ever-more critical extent with
its own limitations. Interdisciplinarity is the project’s key asset: it
aims at a cross-fertilization of theory and practice. Hence, this
PhD-trajectory in Curatorial Research will be conducted in close
interaction with a second PhD-student in Art History, who pursues
research on Ship of Fools / The Dockers’ Museum from a theoretical
perspective. Therefore, whereas the PhD-student in Curatorial Research
will have her/his main office space at M HKA, where she/he will
collaborate closely with M HKA’s research and collection team, a
regular interaction will be built with members of the research team
based at the Lieven Gevaert Centre in Leuven.

Job Description

The principal stake of the PhD-trajectory in Curatorial Research is
articulating an adequate approach to define relevant ‘dispostifs’ for
Ship of Fools / The Dockers’ Museum. The PhD will need to eloquently
come to terms with the ways how Sekula integrated ‘curating’ into his
own artistic production and in what sense such artistic activities may
affect existing museum practices of collection conservation, disclosure
and display.
The successful candidate is therefore expected to develop a
research-based curatorial practice leading up towards a final
PhD-result that consists of a newly conceived, major exhibition of Ship
of Fools / The Dockers’ Museum, which will be accompanied by a written
exegesis (exhibition catalogue). Both components need to be a
doctoral-level contribution that has substantial cultural significance.
The PhD-student is expected to build up towards this final outcome via
intermediary outputs, which consist of both exhibitions and
publications.
The PhD-student will furthermore contribute to the general activities
of the research project (organization of workshops/conferences and of
meetings of the project’s steering committee in curatorial research,
and develop international contacts in the field of curatorial
research). She/he will also be involved in teaching related to the
research project and/or her/his curatorial research expertise.

Job Requirements

Applicants are required:
- to hold a Master’s degree in Art History or Curatorial Research, or
are able to convincingly prove equivalent knowledge when they have a
Master’s qualification in a relevant discipline;
- to demonstrate advanced knowledge of contemporary art, art history,
arts institutions, and research-driven artistic practices;
-to possess relevant work experience with presentational platforms, at
an international level;
-to provide evidence of their research excellence by means of a list of
curated exhibitions and publications (catalogues, essays, papers, etc.);
-to have a high level of English and outstanding writing, research, and
organisational skills.
Familiarity with the work of Allan Sekula will be taken into
consideration as a plus.

Salary

This is a 100% PhD-bursary position, fully salaried and containing all
social security advantages conform to Belgian labor legislation.

Application Procedure

Please send a motivated letter of application and an extensive CV
(which may include selected illustrations of your previous projects) in
pdf-format via e-mail to:

Mr. Dieter Vankeirsbilck
Managing Director
M HKA, Museum voor Hedendaagse Kunst Antwerpen
dieter.vankeirsbilck@muhka.be

The closing date for applications is 30 June 2015. Selected candidates
will be contacted for an interview by 20 July 2015. Candidates invited
for this interview, which will be held on 4 September 2015 in Antwerp,
will be asked to write a short research proposal (max. 750 words) by 15
August 2015. The successful candidate will engage to move to Belgium
and is scheduled to start on 1 October 2015.

For more information, we kindly refer to the homepages of M HKA
(http://www.muhka.be/) and the Lieven Gevaert Centre
(www.lievengevaertcentre.be)