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Join our team! Applications are sought for the position of Assistant Curator The Organisation Based in Darwin on Larrakia Country, the Northern Centre for Contemporary Art (NCCA) is an independent arts organisation that connects audiences with NT, national and international artists through contemporary art exhibitions and programs. NCCA is a forum for ideas and critical engagement with social, aesthetic and conceptual concerns relevant to Northern Australia and Asia. Our values Exchange – Connect and engage artists and audiences across the Northern Territory, Australia and Asia Experimentation – Be ambitious and provide a critical space for artists and curators to take risks. Supportive – encourage artists and audiences to engage with challenging ideas to think about the world differently. Diversity – to be diverse and inclusive in who we are and what we do. Integrity - Conduct business with respect, honesty and transparency. The Position The Assistant Curator role is made for a dynamic all-rounder, operating both independently and in a collaborative team environment. No two days will be same and the successful candidate will be working across all areas of the organisation. This role requires multitasking, excellent time management skills and the capacity to work efficiently in order to deliver high-quality shows within short time-frames. The successful applicant will support and contribute to the development and delivery of the Centre’s exhibitions and associated projects, managing and supporting many administrative procedures including grant writing and correspondence with many of our key stakeholders. There is the potential to curate exhibitions depending on experience and programming requirements. The Assistant Curator will undertake relevant logistical tasks in relation to the exhibition management for the Centre and will report to and work under the guidance and support of the Director. Reporting structure The Assistant Curator reports to the Director, who in turn reports to the Board through the Chair. Contract, Conditions and Hours of Work This is an ongoing position and subject to a six-month probation period. This role has the potential to become a full-time position in 2025, subject to funding. This is a 0.8FTE position, or 30 hours per week. During exhibitions, this will generally be Wednesday-Friday 9am-5pm and Saturdays 8am-2pm. In between exhibition install and de-install, the Saturday hours can be worked on Tuesdays. The salary for this position is in the order of $57,000 per annum pro-rata, inclusive of leave entitlements. Superannuation is 11% as per statutory requirements. Leave entitlements are pro-rata and include four weeks annual leave, and two weeks personal/sick leave. The successful applicant must be an Australian citizen or permanent resident and should obtain a current NT Working with Children Check. The NCCA is an Equal Opportunity Employer and values diversity in the workplace. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and those who identify as culturally and linguistically diverse, are encouraged to apply. To submit your application Please include a cover letter (max 1 page), responses to the selection criteria (max 2 pages), your current CV and three contactable professional referees. Applications are to be submitted via email to the Director, Petrit Abazi, petrit@nccart.com.au by midnight, Sunday 4 February 2024. Please contact Petrit if you have any questions relating to the role. Key Selection Criteria 1. Relevant tertiary qualifications in visual arts (fine arts, art history, curatorial studies, arts administration etc.) and/or knowledge of art gallery practices through work experience. 2. Understanding of curatorial practice and exhibition development, preferably in the areas of contemporary Australian Aboriginal, Australian and International art with demonstrable research and development of exhibition content, checklists and cataloguing skills. 3. Excellent written and oral communication skills, including demonstrated research skills with attention to detail. 4. Proven high level organisational skills and the capacity to prioritise and manage multiple tasks simultaneously with the capacity to work within short time-frames. 5. Proven administration experience with excellent computer skills including the capacity to utilise digital platforms such as Adobe Suite (preferrable) and create word documents, spreadsheets, and databases. Demonstrated high level record management skills that maintain the accuracy and integrity of administrative outputs. 6. Demonstrated understanding of exhibition installation procedures including Workplace Health and Safety principles. 7. A team player with well-developed interpersonal skills and the proven ability to work cooperatively with others including volunteers and casual staff and an ability to interact effectively with people of different cultures. ASSISTANT CURATOR JOB DESCRIPTION Curatorial & Exhibitions Under the guidance of the Director, assist, administer, research, develop and deliver NCCA’s exhibition program, including external and in-house, as well as guest-curator projects. Curate NCCA’s annual end-of-year ‘Members’ Show’ including undertaking administration, sourcing works and seeking members’ participation in order to continually improve and develop the exhibition. There is the potential to curate other exhibitions depending on experience and programming requirements. Under the guidance of the Director implement meaningful education and public programs including workshops, openings and other events that deliver audience engagement objectives. Participate in, and contribute to the installation (including the preparation of exhibition spaces, and installation of labels), maintenance/monitoring and deinstallation of exhibitions in consultation with the Director and in liaison with the installation crew. Ensure that all conditions of loan and touring exhibition agreements are met. Contribute to the receipt, documentation, unpacking and condition reporting of works for exhibition; ensure that exhibition spaces are tidy at all times and that works are appropriately presented respecting artists’ intentions and adhering to OH&S requirements. Manage and work with interns and volunteers on special projects. Complete administrative and practical tasks in support of the delivery of the exhibition program including coordination of the signage schedule, liaising with external designers and various contractors. As required, research, prepare and write exhibition labels and interpretive texts; source images for reproduction and secure copyright clearances; liaise with artists, photographers and other relevant parties, meeting all deadlines. Archive administrative materials including invoices accordingly. Maintain day-to-day upkeep of gallery, exhibitions and gallery services areas. Administration Undertake administrative support for the exhibition program. Provide a professional interface with visitors, stakeholders and artists whether in person, on email or on the telephone. Maintain a register of NCCA members and assist the Director in developing the Membership base. Manage contracts with artists and guest curators in a timely manner. Contribute to the care, storage, maintenance and cataloguing of exhibition equipment and furniture including display plinths. Maintain an inventory of exhibition equipment and furniture including AV equipment. Provide administrative support to the Director as required, including assistance with writing grants and acquittals. Communications Publicise all NCCA artistic and public programs. Promote NCCA’s activities through mail, email and online, including the careful drafting and proofreading of text in line with NCCA’s style guide. Provide and develop content pertaining to the NCCA’s exhibitions and operations on social media platforms. Ensure information on the NCCA website is current and accurate including exhibition content and the calendar of events. General Meet and greet visitors at the front desk during opening hours (Wednesday – Thursday, 10am-4pm and Saturdays 8am-2pm) Develop and maintain good working relationships within the arts sector. Proactively participate in other associated organisational initiatives and activities as required. Regularly brief the Director of developments, including prompt communication and careful management of changes or risks. Prepare and deliver run-sheets for speeches and ensure opening nights, art talks and lectures run smoothly. Assist with the identification of OHS risks, seek improvements and induct all artists into NCCA’s OH&S policy and general operations before they start work on site. Maintain close communication with Director. Other duties as required by the Director. Applications are due by midnight, Sunday 4 February. Submit via email to petrit@nccart.com.au Click here to download a pdf version of the position description. Got questions? Get in touch so we can start working together. First Name Last Name Email Message Send Thanks for submitting! A team member will be in touch soon.

Manifesta 14 22 July - 30 October 2022 The trio of curator Petrit Abazi, performance artist and painter Piers Greville and artist Stanislava Pinchuk will collaborate for Manifesta 14 Prishtina. Curator Petrit Abazi (1983, XK/AUS) was born in Mitrovica, Kosovo. His curatorial practice has a particular focus on borders (geographic, political and social) investigating how margins are drawn or erased and studies their relationality to lived experiences. Piers Greville (1972, AUS) is a contemporary artist with a studio practice in painting and field-based performance. A former mountain endurance athlete, Piers Greville returns to this activity of tracing the landscape, physically traversing the terrain and manifesting it through his work. Stanislava Pinchuk (1988, UKR) is an Ukrainian artist working with data-mapping the changing topographies of war and conflict zones. Her work surveys how landscape holds memory and is testament to political events, including drawings, installations, tattooing, films & sculpture. Catalogue Curator Petrit Abazi Artist Stanislava Pinchuk Piers Greville 1/0

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Open Cut Public programs: Artist panel, Saturday 12 August 12 noon; other public programs tba. An exhibition of photographic portraits by Therese Ritchie forms the core of the exhibition, supported by paintings by Jacky Green. The works overall represent a collection of Garawa voices from Borroloola in the Gulf region of the NT in response to the impact of development and mining in particular on their country. Ritchie’s portraits continue a recent development in her photo-based practice where the body of the subject/sitter is inscribed with text that has been chosen/stated by the sitter; the works are highly collaborative in their construction and in this case facilitated by Jacky Green and Sean Kerins, a Canberra-based anthropol- ogist who has researched and written extensively on the Gulf region and related cultural and economic issues, and who has previously collaborated with Jacky Green to present exhibitions in Melbourne and Canberra. This show is to coincide with the Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Awards exhibition at the Museum and Art Gallery NT, Darwin; part of Darwin Festival program. 1/0

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…as the Serpent Struggles Ann Newmarch (b. 1945) O.A.M is a senior South Australian artist who was at the vanguard of feminist art in Australia in the early 1970s, making her mark as a printmaker, photographer, and painter in particular, and through community-engaged, activist projects such as public murals and, in part, her latest exhibition, … as the Serpent Struggles. Ann produced this significant body of paintings and prints during the 1980s, inspired by her experience of the Central and Western Desert areas of the NT and SA and by the challenge of a postcolonial view. Ann’s engagement with Aboriginal art in these works is prescient of broader debates around cultural authenticity and representation, as surveyed by the later seminal exhibition From Appropriation to Appreciation (Flinders University Art Museum, 1988) which included her work. The exhibition’s central motif of the car or car-wreck in the desert predates the cliché, just as Ann’s approach (to) and treatment of a desert Aboriginal aesthetic (in ‘dot’ painting) came at a time when the so-called desert acrylic-on-canvas movement was first beginning to take hold. Ann’s work responds to the immediacy of this movement and to the presence and palette of Aboriginal desert iconography. Her dotting/pixilation is also about the screen – both as and in reference to screenprinting and screen-mediated culture. ‘An artist has a responsibility as an image-maker to concerns wider than herself or her art’, says Ann, quoted in a recent article in The Australian about her politicised screenprints (Bronwyn Watson, ‘Ann Newmarch print at Flinders Uni tackles radiation and birth defects’, 16 July 2016). ‘It’s not much use being concerned only about women’s art when uranium is being mined and Aborigines are losing their land, and when Uncle Sam stings your armpit and your kids want to eat at Hungry Jack’s, and when TV takes the place of learning and doing.’ Since 1969, Ann Newmarch has presented over 30 solo exhibitions and participated in over 100 significant group exhibitions, including the well-known WACK! Art and the Feminist Revolution international exhibition, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2007) in which she was the only Australian artist represented. … as the Serpent Struggles is timed to coincide with the WOW (Women of the World) Festival, GYRACC, Katherine, 16-18 September, at which a number of prints by Ann will also be on display. 1/0

Tennant Creek Mens’ Centre Art Tennant Creek Mens’ Centre Art Public programs: Artist panel, Saturday 12 August 1pm; other public programs tba. This is an exhibition of experimental paintings/2D works by participants in an art therapy program for Aboriginal men in Tennant Creek; The program was run by Anyinginyi Health’s Piliyintinji-ki Stronger Families Men’s Centre and facilitated by Melbourne/NT-based artist Rupert Betheras. Artists (working list): Rupert Betheras, Fabian Brown, George Butler, Scott Butler, Marcus Camphoo, Jeremiah Curtis, Timothy Dickson, Bradley Duggie, David Duggie, Danny Frank, Alfred Lauder, Elton Limbian, Neville Murphy, James Nelson, Merlin Newcastle, Fabian Rankine, Eddie Small, Kevin Shannon, Joseph Williams, Simon Wilson. 1/0

Cut Colony Launch: Friday 4 March 6-8pm Melbourne-based artist Cate Consandine interrogates the Australian postcolonial in her film-based work Cut Colony (2012). Consandine explores in this work the relationship between subjects and unforgiving landscapes as physical expressions of psychological states. Both the clay pans and desert lakes of outback New South Wales set the stage for awkward and assertive interactions between the subject and the environment; tense performances that invoke and consider binaries of wet/dry, masculine/feminine, stillness/movement, open/contained, composed and uneasy. Consandine explains, “The relationship that I have as a white Australian in this country to something that’s unnerving, unsettling about these expansive interior landscapes which for someone who’s living in Melbourne and kind of existing on the fringes of this continent… still finds it hard to reconcile herself with, as I think many Australians find it hard to reconcile themselves with their relationship to the Australian landscape and these central desert areas.” Cut Colony will show in the Screeroom at NCCA 27 February to 26 March. Cate Consandine works across a wide range of formal and discursive mediums, including sculpture and spatial practice, video and performance. Her research interrogates the body in the Australian landscape, and its condition in relation to the physiological and psychoanalytic elaborations of space and its emotion. Consandine has exhibited nationally and internationally since 1999. She is a Lecturer in Sculpture and Spatial Practice in the School of Art, Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne. She received a PhD from Monash University in 2015, and is represented by Sarah Scout Presents gallery, Melbourne. 1/0

Gonzo Décor – Hunting Trophies (Southern Windows series) Artist talk: 11am, Saturday 15 November, NCCA Adelaide-based Ben Leslie presents sculptural installation in the Boxset as part of André Lawrence’s SouthernWindows series of window gallery-based exhibitions, placing the work of exceptional emerging South Australian artists in the NT. The project’s curator, André Lawrence, is from the NT and currently based in Adelaide. Lawrence states: ‘The premise for this series of exhibitions, while inherently tied to my own identity as a part-Northern Territorian, was also founded in a desire to uncover and explore past relationships between the NT and SA in order to develop future ones’. Leslie is an emerging artist and sculptor, and Director of Operations at Fontanelle Gallery & Studios, Adelaide. His bold sculptural forms often take tropes from monumentalism, animalism and the formless, spurred by informed and often humorous responses to art theoretical ideas and writing. The production/installation of this work has been assisted by the Helpmann Academy, Adelaide. 1/0

Nigel Sense: Visitor Centre 11 March - 16 April 2022 Darwin-based artist, Nigel Sense transforms NCCA into his interpretation of a visitor centre. In addition to newly-commissioned large canvases, the exhibition sees Sense experimenting with new materials as he paints Territory icons on eskies, t-shirts, plates, and a family-sized camping tent. Showcasing a collection of must-see places from the viewpoint of someone who has recently moved here, this is Nigel Sense’s very own Welcome to the NT Visitor Centre. Catalogue Artists Talk Nigel Sense Saturday 9 April - 11am Michael Fox presents Tax Maters for the Arts Saturday 12 March - 11am Curator Petrit Abazi Artist Nigel Sense 1/0

The Other The ghost of art practices past haunt Darwin artist Leon Waud out of a 14-year hiatus and back once again to making art. His exhibition in Gallery 2, ’The Other’, is comprised of sculptural works, paintings and interactive digital film. Ghostliness is a lingering theme of this work, not only in the sense of apparitions but also as ‘traces’ – moments, gaps and juxtapositions which suggest the eerie presence of the in-between. Ghostliness for Waud is also a manifestation of fear and the power of a fearfulness he has imbued in certain objects: “This fear seems to be completely irrational but however it is there existing outside of rationality; this for me was the other.” Leon Waud is a Darwin-based artist who works across a range of mediums. He holds a Bachelor of Arts with Honors from the Queensland University of Technology. He has held solo shows including Same Shit Different Room, Soapbox Gallery, Brisbane (2002) and No Fixed Address, Development Space, Metro Arts Brisbane (1999); and participated in a number of group shows including: Serendipity and Lunacy (in contemporary photography), Soapbox Gallery, Brisbane (2002), Between Now and Tomorrow, Gallery 482, Brisbane (2002) and Endzone, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane (2000). 1/0