de appel curatorial programme 2026/2027
The de Appel Curatorial Programme in Amsterdam is one of the earliest curatorial training programmes in the world. It was created in 1994 to help emerging curators learn through praxis rather than only studying theory. What distinguishes it is its small group size and deep emphasis on collective praxis. Participants travel together, meet artists and cultural practitioners, and build lasting relationships while exploring how to shape public cultural programmes through curating a project together at de Appel and beyond.
de Appel invites applications for the 2026/27 Curatorial Programme, a ten-month programme that brings together a small international group of participants to collectively study, travel, research and develop a curatorial project together in Amsterdam.
The 2026/27 edition is centred on a set of interconnected themes and practices that de Appel is engaged with: land, co-ownership and housing, governance, and (art) economy and class. These themes are approached not as abstract subjects, but rather as lived social and political conditions that shape cultural work today within institutions and across wider social contexts.
At de Appel, we’ve come to understand curating as a practice that exceeds exhibition making. Alongside the development of exhibitions and public programmes, participants engage with questions of institution-building, collective governance, economic sustainability, and structural change, exploring how curatorial practice can move from critique toward the construction of alternative forms of organisation and how that changes content.