Wondering how to protect yourself and negotiate for fairer conditions of labor as a freelance artist or cultural practitioner? Tired and confused about work contracts and fee agreements? Feeling insecure and unsure because nobody guided you through the process? We’re here to help!

Join Gendai for an online contracts workshop on Tuesday, 23 June from 3:00 to 5:30 pm CET.

The workshop will be held in spoken English and in an accessible, low-threshold, relaxed format, with ample breaks and the option to turn your camera and mic on/off.

Gendai is a collective based in Tkaronto/Toronto dedicated to building a more equitable art sector through collective research with BIPOC artists and arts workers. Together, we will look at institutional contracts from the contemporary art sector to discuss how they could be more supportive for freelance artists, curators, and/or arts workers. 

The workshop aims to reform contract language by starting with the material needs of freelance artists, curators, and arts workers. We will look at samples of employment or exhibition contracts issued by cultural institutions and collectively critique them. Which terms are supportive, which are punitive, and how can we demand better? We encourage participants to bring a contract that they are currently struggling with and use our discussion as a leveraging tactic. Participants can also bring an older contract, as an example of what worked and what didn’t.

Please note that we will not have lawyers present at the workshop. Due to Datenschutz laws in Germany, we understand if you cannot share contracts that you have signed, or if you are concerned about breaching privacy laws. All participants of this online workshop agree to keep the information shared within this workshop to themselves and not to share it outside of this event.

With your consent, discussions in the workshop will contribute towards materials for Gendai CBA, an online, crowd-sourced database of contracts commonly encountered by contemporary art practitioners. The project informally and anonymously utilizes collective bargaining power to encourage sector transparency and demand more equitable standards for labour conditions in the arts. A beta version of Gendai CBA is available here.

For more information on Gendai’s work on contracts, check out their interview in the podcast The Transparency that Helps All of Us by Geneviève Wallen. Gendai has also published their research in the Gossip issue of C Magazine, titled “We Should Talk: Obvious Truths About Working in the Arts.”

These and more resources will be shared with the participants of this online workshop. 

Places are limited, so sign up today for the Zoom link! 🙂