Urban Arts Space & Hopkins Hall Gallery

Call for Exhibition Proposals

About This Call

Urban Arts Space (UAS) and Hopkins Hall Gallery (HHG) invite proposals for exhibitions.

UAS staff manage both galleries, so the services, policies, and review process in this call apply to both. The galleries differ in where they are, who they serve, and who can apply:

The Two Galleries

Exhibition Disclaimer 

Any non-UAS directed project that displays artwork in either gallery is an exhibition, and therefore, must go through this request-for-proposal (RFP) submission process. That includes pop-ups, fundraisers, events that show artwork, and events attached to lectures or conferences. UAS does not hold calendar dates outside of this process. Rentals and programs without artwork follow a separate request process. Please send rental inquiries to uas@osu.edu with all available information about your event, including a brief description, proposed date/time, estimated attendance, technology needs, and layout. 

Curricular exhibitions governed by Ohio State department agreements, including the MFA thesis, AAEP, Dance, BFA, and Design shows, are scheduled through those agreements rather than through this call.
 

RFP Timeline

A slot is the window your exhibition falls within, not a required length; a Summer 2028 UAS show might run the full May–September window or four to six weeks within it. UAS may schedule more than one exhibition in a window, in different galleries or one after another.

UAS sets the length and final dates of each exhibition and assigns gallery space. If specific dates matter to your project (an anniversary, a related event, a course calendar), note them in your proposal. Once confirmed, install, opening, reception, and strike dates do not move unless UAS approves the change.

Exhibition Slots

Services and Amenities Provided

• Installation by UAS staff and student preparators (framing not included)
• Pedestals, display cases, lighting, TV screens, and projectors from a limited inventory
• Limited signage, including title vinyl and labels
• Marketing: flyer design and printing, social media promotion
• Reception space with light refreshments
• Planning support: UAS staff work with selected applicants on layout and installation

What UAS Does Not Provide

UAS cannot pay artist fees or cover shipping, transportation, framing, specialized hardware, furniture, or storage at this time. We name that plainly for full transparency and because we ask a great deal of the artists we work with.

What we can do: every selected project receives a written statement of the in-kind support UAS is providing, valued in dollars, which you may cite as match in applications to Greater Columbus Arts Council, Ohio Arts Council, and other funders. UAS will also provide a letter of support, upon request, and will schedule a conversation about grant timelines early enough to apply. 

How to Apply

Submit your proposal through SlideRoom: 

SlideRoom Proposal Application

There is no application fee. Questions about the call can go to uas@osu.edu.

What to submit

1. Venue and slot. Choose UAS or HHG (HHG is for Ohio State applicants only) and the slot you want.
2. Project summary. A title and a short description of the exhibition (150 words maximum).

3. Proposal narrative, in three parts of up to 250 words each: your concept, your plan for the space and how visitors move through it, and how people will take part. You may add a visual, such as a sketch, a marked-up floor plan, or reference images. For Hopkins Hall Gallery, please include connections to courses, research, or programs. Floor plans for both galleries: 

   Urban Arts Space Floor Plan: https://uas.osu.edu/media/283699  

   Hopkins Hall Gallery Floor Plan: https://uas.osu.edu/media/283700  

4. Work samples. Up to 10 images and up to 5 minutes of video or audio in total, each with title, year, medium, and dimensions or running time. Samples can show past work, work proposed for this exhibition, or both. Mark each one as existing or proposed. If the proposed work does not exist yet, include representative past work and any sketches or mockups.
5. Checklist and technical needs. List the works you plan to show, existing or new, with sizes, weights, and any power, AV, or hanging needs. For new work, include a timeline to completion.
6. Team. Specify names, roles, and short bios for everyone involved, with the project lead named as the point of contact. Individuals, collectives, and organizations all use the same application; groups list every member here.
7. AI disclosure. Answer the form’s questions about whether and how generative AI is part of the project. If you are asking for an exception to the “Includes generative AI” label, explain why (see Artificial Intelligence below).
8. Photography and consent. Any limits on photographing or filming your work. If your project photographs, records, or collects material from participants, how you will ask for their consent (see Photography, Images, and Consent below).

How Proposals Are Reviewed

The exhibition committee scores every complete proposal on the same criteria. Incomplete proposals are not reviewed. Our values are creativity, access, connection, exploration, and curriculum. The criteria below are how we score for them. The numbers in the UAS and HHG columns are weights: they show how much each criterion counts at that venue, and each venue’s weights add up to 20. Reviewers rate every criterion from 1 (weak) to 5 (strong), and each rating is multiplied by its weight, for a maximum score of 100. 

“Access” scores the thinking behind your plan for visitors, not polished writing or prior curatorial experience; whether you can carry it out is scored under Feasibility. A less-developed audience plan does not disqualify a proposal.

Words We Use, and What We Mean by Them

The committee reads the Access and Connection criteria through these definitions, which UAS staff developed together. They describe the kind of partnership we are looking for.

• Participatory practice. A way of working where people are treated as active co-creators of diverse cultural experiences, through four models of participation: contributory, collaborative, co-creative, and hosted.
• Regenerative engagement. Sustaining long-term relationships to support the development, healing, and renewal of the artistic and cultural ecosystem in Columbus and beyond.
• Equity-focused partnership. A collaborative relationship designed to address structural barriers by intentionally redistributing UAS capacity: time, treasure, and talent.
• Extractive labor. A harmful practice where an organization pulls maximum productivity, ideas, or emotional energy from people without providing fair compensation, structural support, or long-term reinvestment. 
• Collaboration. Two or more individuals, teams, or organizations aligning their goals and blending their perspectives to co-construct knowledge and solve a shared challenge.

If Your Proposal Is Selected

Please read these before applying.

1. One point of contact. The project lead speaks for the project. For group shows, confirm decisions within your group before bringing requests to UAS.
2. Paperwork deadlines. A signed loan agreement, a final checklist of works, and label and statement text are due 4 weeks before install.
3. Material changes after acceptance, including changes in how AI is used, need written approval from the UAS director. UAS may decline to present work that differs meaningfully from the proposal.
4. Install-ready work. Work arrives ready to hang or place, with appropriate hardware. UAS approves all hanging and mounting methods.
5. Walls, floors, and ceilings. Nothing is drawn, painted, or fixed directly to them without written approval in advance.
6. Transport and pickup. Artists deliver work in the drop-off calendar window UAS assigns and collect it by the strike date. UAS cannot ship or store work.
7. Cleanup. UAS handles routine gallery maintenance. Artists remove their own materials, supplies, and tools after install and strike.
8. Events in the space. Talks, critiques, performances, and receptions are confirmed with UAS. For HHG, after-hours access requires a full-time Ohio State faculty or staff member as the responsible party; students cannot serve in that role.
9. Insurance. Ohio State does not insure student work. Student lenders carry their own coverage or sign a waiver on the loan agreement.

Artificial Intelligence

UAS does not ban AI in art, and AI use does not count for or against a proposal. We ask for transparency, at two levels:

• For the committee. The submission form asks whether generative AI is part of your project and, if so, how: which tools or models you used, what they did, and how much of the work they shaped. Custom-trained models and AI-generated material you rework both count. Proposals that use AI are scored on the same criteria as every other proposal.
• For visitors. Work made in part with generative AI is labeled “Includes generative AI.” Your artist statement can describe your process in as much depth as you choose. If a label would undercut the concept of the work, say so in your proposal and the committee will consider an exception.

A change in how AI is used after acceptance is a material change (see If Your Proposal Is Selected, item 3). Read the full AI policy: https://uas.osu.edu/media/283698.

Photography, Images, and Consent

Exhibitions at UAS and HHG are photographed and filmed, and images of them are shared widely.

Your rights and ours

• You keep copyright. You own your work and the rights to it. Exhibiting does not transfer ownership of the work or its copyright.
• Permission to document and promote. By exhibiting, you give UAS and Ohio State a non-exclusive, royalty-free permission to photograph and film your work, the installation, and related programs, and to use those images during and after the exhibition for gallery education, marketing, and promotion, and to document and report on it in print and digital materials. That includes the UAS and Ohio State websites and social media, press and media, flyers and print materials, grant applications and reports to funders, annual reports, teaching, and the UAS exhibition archive.
• Your work samples. If your proposal is selected, UAS may use the images you submitted to announce and promote the exhibition. Images from proposals that are not selected are used only for review.
• No sales. UAS does not sell images of your work or license them to anyone else for commercial use.
• Credit. UAS credits images with your name, the title, year, and medium of the work, and the photographer, wherever the format allows. Tell us in your proposal exactly how you want to be credited.
• Your use of our images. UAS shares its installation photographs with you. You may use them for your portfolio, website, social media, and grant applications, with credit to the photographer and "Courtesy of Urban Arts Space, The Ohio State University."

Photography in the galleries

• Visitors. Visitors may take photos and video for personal, non-commercial use. Flash, tripods, and commercial shoots need advance approval from UAS.
• Press. Media requests to photograph or film the exhibition go through UAS, and UAS lets you know when press is coming.
• Limits on your work. If any work cannot be photographed, filmed, or shown before the opening, or should not be shown with flash or close up, say so in your proposal. UAS posts signage and asks staff to remind visitors, but cannot guarantee that every visitor follows it.

Photographing people

• Programs and receptions. Openings, talks, and performances may be photographed, filmed, or livestreamed. UAS posts notice on the website event listings so attendees know.
• Your team and performers. Everyone presenting or performing in your project should expect to be photographed. Let UAS know of anyone who cannot be.
• Young people. UAS does not publish identifiable images of anyone under 18 without a signed release from a parent or guardian.
• Participatory work. If your project photographs or records visitors, or collects their images, voices, stories, or objects, describe in your proposal how people will agree to take part, how the material will be used and shared, and what happens to it when the exhibition closes.
• Material you did not make. If your work uses music, footage, archival images, or other material made by others, you are responsible for having permission to show it and for letting UAS use it in promotion.

Images online and AI

Once images are public, neither UAS nor Ohio State can control how others use them, including their collection to train AI models. If that is a concern for your work, tell us in your proposal so we can talk through photography limits before the show opens.

Viewpoints

Work shown at UAS and HHG reflects the perspectives and choices of the exhibiting artists. Inclusion in the galleries does not represent the positions of UAS, its staff, or its student arts administrators.