Want to develop your art writing skills, be published online, and get paid? Unsure about sharing your writing with others and looking for extra support? This is a paid opportunity open to writers at an early stage in their career (unpublished or emerging) and will include training and mentorship from Jo Manby (the Fourdrinier Editor) and Laura Robertson (The Double Negative Co-Editor and Co-founder).

Each of the three new writers will also be paired up with one of three of our regular contributing writers on the scheme, to work together on critiquing and co-editing each other’s writing.The three successful applicants will work closely alongside the Fourdrinier‘s editor and their new writing partner to each identify and generate four original, paid pieces of critical writing to be published between 2023 and 2024/5.

Overview
Have you had one or two texts published, or nothing at all? Perhaps you’ve been secretly writing for years, or have just started to explore your interest in writing? We’re looking for any writer interested in contemporary art, from a diverse, underrepresented background, at an early stage in their career.

What do we mean by diverse, underrepresented backgrounds? We seek to promote ‘equality and diversity for people from protected characteristic groups defined in the Equality Act 2010 – including age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation. We also recognise the barriers that arise from class and socio-economic status.’This aligns our equality aims with the definition given by Arts Council England in their introduction to their Equality Objectives as outlined in the 2021-2024 Delivery Plan.

About the commissions
Commissioned writing will relate to any of the following categories:
– Art work by a local or regional contemporary artist
– Exhibitions of work by national or international artists exhibiting in the North
– Exhibitions that embrace the diversity of contemporary visual art culture and/or work by diverse or underrepresented art practitioners