The Skinny x Edinburgh Art Festival: Emerging Writers Open Call

Attention new writers! We're once again teaming up with Edinburgh Art Festival on an emerging writers' programme. After the success of our 2022 programme, we're looking to commision writing on the EAF 2023 programme from four emerging writers and critics based in Scotland.

Each selected writer will write about two projects from the 2023 festival for publishing on our website. Writers will be supported with a group session with members of the EAF team and our art editor Harvey Dimond. You'll also receive a fee of £150.

We're keen to give a platform to writers whose voices are currently underrepresented in Scottish cultural journalism and conversation, including (but not limited to) LGBTQ+ writers and writers of marginalised genders, writers from BIPOC backgrounds, writers from rural areas or socio-economically marginalised backgrounds, and disabled and neurodivergent writers.

Sound good? Take a look at the EAF programme – find the full details here – then send us a pitch on the two exhibitions, elements or themes from the programme you'd like to write about, and how you'd like to cover them. We don't have any fixed idea of what your writing should look like; it could be poetic, critical, reflective, responsive, or something else entirely. As long as it engages with the artwork, we're keen to hear it.

Edinburgh Art Festival Emerging Writers: The details

First, fill in this application form (.doc, via the Edinburgh Art Festival website). Please send your pitch to info@edinburghartfestival.com with the subject line ‘Emerging Writers Application’. In your application, please demonstrate a commitment to writing about the visual arts in Scotland.

The deadline for applications is Sunday 28 May at 5pm. 

Selected writers will receive a fee of £150, for two published pieces of writing of 500 words or less.

A small fund is available towards the cost of travel and access; however unfortunately we will not be able to cover hotel or accommodation costs.

For more details, contact info@edinburghartfestival.com