Curator resume template
A clean starting structure with example content grounded in what curators actually do day to day, not generic filler. Download and replace the bracketed placeholders with your own details.
Which resume format should you use?
Reverse chronological
You have a steady work history. This is the format almost every recruiter and ATS expects by default.
Functional
You're changing fields or have gaps in your employment. Leads with skills rather than a job-by-job timeline.
Combination
You're early career or have worked consistently but for only a few employers. Blends a skills summary with a shorter chronological history.
This template uses the reverse chronological format: the one most curators should default to, since most Australian recruiters and ATS software expect it.
Professional summary
Curator with experience across collection management, exhibition development and interpretive writing in cultural institutions. Skilled at coordinating loans, design and installation while keeping research and public engagement at the centre of the work. Comfortable working with artists, lenders and community groups to make collections meaningful for diverse audiences.
Key skills
- Exhibition development and project management
- Collection documentation and cataloguing
- Provenance research and due diligence
- Loan negotiation and condition reporting
- Interpretive writing and catalogue texts
- Community and stakeholder engagement
- Axiell Collections
- The Museum System (TMS)
- Vernon CMS
- Adobe Creative Cloud (InDesign, Photoshop)
- Microsoft Office
- Copyright and cultural protocols
Experience: example bullet points
- Developed exhibition concepts from research brief to installation, coordinating design, loans and labels across a schedule that ran for more than a year.
- Documented and catalogued a collection of several thousand objects in Axiell Collections, improving record accuracy and making items easier to find for research and display.
- Secured loans from interstate and overseas institutions by preparing condition reports, negotiating agreements and managing transport and insurance requirements.
- Wrote catalogue essays and interpretive text for a touring exhibition that travelled to four regional venues, adapting content for different audiences.
- Led community consultation with local Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander groups to shape exhibition content, protocols and public programs.
- Managed exhibition budgets and schedules, reducing last-minute installation changes by bringing registrars, designers and conservators into planning early.
Education
A postgraduate qualification in museum studies, curatorship or a related field is the common pathway, often following an honours or bachelor degree in art history, history, archaeology or a cognate discipline.
Keywords an ATS is likely to scan for
Applicant tracking systems match your resume against terms in the job ad before a person ever sees it. Only include the ones that actually apply to your experience, but if a term below matches something you've done, use the same wording the job ad uses.
- Australian Museums and Galleries Association (AMaGA)
- Australian Institute for the Conservation of Cultural Material (AICCM)
- collection management
- provenance research
- exhibition development
- interpretive writing
- loans and acquisitions
- Axiell Collections
- The Museum System (TMS)
- Vernon CMS
- Adobe Creative Cloud
- Microsoft Office
- Working with Children Check
- National Standards for Australian Museums and Galleries
- First Nations cultural protocols
- copyright and moral rights
- GLAM sector
- touring exhibitions
- condition reporting
Getting past ATS screening
- Match the specific skills, certifications and terms used in the job ad, not just your own wording for the same thing.
- Keep formatting simple: no tables, text boxes, columns, headers/footers or graphics. Parsers frequently drop content placed in these.
- Submit as .docx or PDF unless the job ad specifies otherwise.
- Use standard section headings (Experience, Education, Skills) rather than creative alternatives.
- List your core skills and technical competencies in their own section so a keyword scan can find them instantly.
This is a starting point, not a guarantee of interviews. Tailor every bullet point to your own real experience and the specific job ad.