Call for Proposals: 2027-2029 Programming at Workers Arts & Heritage Centre

In the Wake of Work (2025), curated by JoJo Chooi-Harley featuring work by VALU CO-OP, Holly Chang, and mihyun maria kim. Photo: Justine McCloskey.

2027-2029 Call for Submissions
Workers Arts & Heritage Centre

The Workers Arts & Heritage Centre (WAHC) is dedicated to sharing and celebrating the stories of Canada’s working people through contemporary art, labour and people’s heritage exhibits, a permanent collection, and digital projects. WAHC’s mandate is to preserve, honour, and promote the culture and history of all working people. Through an exploration of our collective experiences of labour, we aim to educate, inspire, and commemorate working people today. We do this from Hamilton’s Custom House, a heritage building and national historic site on the original territories of the Huron, Wendat and Neutrals, and later, the Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe.

More information about WAHC can be found at www.wahc-museum.ca.

We are currently seeking proposals from artists, art collectives, and curators for exhibitions and curatorial projects. If selected, these proposals will form our program offerings beginning with the Spring season in 2027, until 2029.

We are interested in proposals that activate our CUPE/SCFP Gallery with artistic interventions that explore themes including but not limited to the following:

• Resource extraction, labour, environmental justice, and just transitions
• Decolonized and Indigenous perspectives of labour
• Intersections of labour, race, class, gender, and ability
• Invisibilized and unpaid labour
• Globalized labour
• Labour futurisms, the future of work
• Projects in conversation with working people’s histories, heritage, and culture, past and present
• Projects centred on community engagement, collaboration, and co-creation

A floor plan of our main gallery space is below.

Priority Groups

We prioritize projects connecting underrepresented or marginalized communities in Canada with worker’s history, art, and culture. We encourage applications from BIPOC artists and curators, persons with disabilities, immigrants and refugees, Francophones, emerging and youth voices, 2SLGBTQIA+, and women.

Artistic Media

WAHC exhibitions showcase all media including installation, interdisciplinary, and community-engaged arts. Due to the nature of our multi-use space, large sculptural works that are not easily moved cannot be accommodated.

Compensation

The CUPE/SCFP Gallery at the Workers Arts & Heritage Centre is a professional exhibition space that pays artists and curators in accordance with CARFAC fees for a Category 1 institution (Section 1 – Exhibition and Screening Royalty Schedule).

Professional fees associated with ancillary programs are also paid in accordance with the CARFAC fee schedule recommendations (Section 4 – Artist Professional Services Fee Schedule).

Community members and members of the Naujawan Support Network (NSN) at the opening reception of Foreign Dreams featuring work by Simranpreet Kaur Anand with Conner Singh VanderBeek, September 2024.

Application Requirements

To apply, please include the following in a single PDF document (naming convention: lastname_WAHCApplication):

• Cover letter that includes a mailing address, phone number, and website link (1 page max)
• Project description (500 word max) including concept, spatial, and technical requirements
• Statement (250 word max) on how your work relates to WAHC’s mandate as described above
• Biography (200 word max for each artist or collective applicant)
• CV (3 page max)

Support Material:

Image/Support material list stating date, medium, and dimensions of work

• A maximum of 6 images
  ◦ Images should be in JPEG format no larger than 1024 x 768 pixels.
  ◦ Images should be numbered 01 to 06 with last name (i.e. 01_lastname_title). Do not embed images in PowerPoint, Microsoft Word, etc.
  or:
  2 video clips or audio
  ◦ Maximum three minutes each.
  ◦ Files should be in .MP3, .MP4, or .MOV format.
  ◦ Files should be numbered 01 to 02 with last name (i.e. 01_lastname_title).

Deadline: July 19, 2026 at 11:59pm ET
Submit to: submissions@wahc-museum.ca

Additional Info

• Note that while we will try to answer any questions applicants may have prior to the deadline, WAHC staff will not review draft applications.
• Decisions are final. Our ability to offer feedback on decisions is limited.

WAHC is located on the original territories of the Huron, Wendat and Neutrals, and later, the Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe.

WAHC is an accessible space.

Workers Arts & Heritage Centre
51 Stuart Street
Hamilton, ON L8L 1B5
(905) 522-3003
www.wahc-museum.ca

Open Wednesday – Saturday, 10am – 4pm

Instagram @workersartsandheritage
Facebook @WorkersArtsandHeritageCentre
TikTok @wahcmuseum

Image Descriptions:
1. A sunny gallery space with monitors on the far wall and a sculpture made of wood, dried plants, and textiles in the centre.
2. A birds-eye view of a gallery floorplan. Total room measurements are 43′ x 24.′
3. A large group of people pose smiling with their fists raised under a banner that reads, “Good Enough to Work, Good Enough to Stay.”