Tender: Better Open Calls

Overview

Better Open Calls is a research project examining how arts organisations find and choose artists, with a focus on testing equitable processes. The project specifically addresses the experiences and careers of artists facing structural barriers, including those from lower socio-economic backgrounds, minoritised ethnic backgrounds, LGBT+ communities, and others.

Research Focus

The project examines artist open calls—where organisations produce an open brief and artists apply in competition. Through research and conversations with artists and partners, the project investigates why artists experiencing structural barriers make fewer applications to open calls, why those that do apply are selected less often, and how artists can be matched with opportunities more efficiently.

Tender Symposium

• Dates: Wednesday 30 and Thursday 31 March
• Online event
• Two public panels on the processes arts organisations use to find artists and the organisational and wider cultural values that drive these processes
• Followed by a closed roundtable with artists with varied lived experiences and different structural barriers

Key Barriers Identified

• Time and money: Finding relevant projects and writing applications takes significant time; competition is fierce with only one successful applicant; artists may not afford the time away from earning money elsewhere
• Lack of transparency: Arts organisations are not always clear about what or who they are looking for and why

Guiding Principles

The project recognises that there is no single process to make open calls fairer. Organisations can use different matching strategies and have different resource levels that limit what they can do. Approaches may reduce barriers for one group of artists but inadvertently present barriers to another. Flexibility in all processes is key to keeping access broad.