Multistory

Arts Council England; West Midlands; Remote; GBP 270 - 330; Part time

Benefits offered by this job

Editorial support

Travel reimbursement

Job summary

Multistory invites writers based in the Black Country to contribute to The Printing Room Issue 4. This open call seeks hybrid and experimental critical reflections on arts criticism as space-holding and care, exploring culture that matters to you.

Writers will receive a £250 fee plus £50 towards materials, with local travel costs reimbursed. The project includes a co-editing workshop led by Kevin Hunt on 3 December 2026.

Qualifications

• Experience in creative writing or arts criticism.
• Ability to produce experimental, hybrid, or collaborative writing.
• Interest in Black Country culture and regional arts.

Responsibilities

• Write a critical reflection piece for The Printing Room Issue 4.
• Participate in the workshop led by Kevin Hunt.
• Submit drafts by the stated deadlines.

Skills

Creative writing

Critical reflections

Research

Job description

Fri, 02 Oct 2026">published - Fri, 02 Oct 2026

Job Summary

For Issue 4 of The Printing Room, to be published in early 2028, Multistory is looking for hybrid and experimental critical reflections from five Black Country-based artists and writers.

Job Description

We invite you to explore 'arts criticism' as an act of holding space and to write a text about an area of culture that interests you, or that you deeply care about: be it an artwork, film, song, story, object, place, moment in time or a cultural movement. We're interested in critical writing pieces that challenge the top-down, elitist approach to thinking or writing about art, and that explore the subversive potential of writing from a place of love: unconventional texts that move towards a more generous, peer-to-peer arts ecosystem. What is a story, place, or artistic work that you think deserves to be held and remembered? Your response might ground itself directly in the urgencies, community histories or spaces of the Black Country, or it might look further afield to an idea or work that inspires you.

We welcome experimental, hybrid and collaborative writing in all styles, that could include (but not be limited to): autofiction (essays merging factual and fictive storytelling), poetry, songwriting, scriptwriting, arts critique, memories and cultural reflections. Or conversational pieces such as transcripts, letters, dialogues or exchanges between collaborators, and/or photo-essays, annotated maps or other hybridised works combining images and text.

We are delighted to announce that, for Issue 4, artist and writer Kevin Hunt will join us as co-editor and will be leading a workshop with the selected cohort of writers on Thursday 3 December, 2026.

Kevin Hunt is an artist and writer originally from Liverpool, now working cross-regionally between the Midlands, Wales and the North West of England. Drawing from personal experiences and memories navigating lower-class architecture, and often incorporating the materials, forms and language that surrounded him during his formative teenage years, his sculptural - and more recently, written-practice - emerges from his queer and working class perspective. Kevin is the inaugural West Midlands Regional Editor for Corridor8.

Job Requirements

Each writer will receive a £250 fee and £50 towards materials, plus editorial support. Local travel costs to the workshop will be reimbursed.

Production Schedule

First draft deadline: required by the end of January, 2027.

Final draft deadline: required by mid-March, 2027.

The Printing Room was established through Multistory's artist development programme, Blast! that champions emerging artists from across the Black Country and provides time, space and support to take creative risks and develop new work. The journal is designed and printed by The Holodeck, a printmaking and design studio founded in 2013 in Birmingham, specialising in Risograph, Letterpress and traditional printmaking techniques. Blast! is funded by Arts Council of England.

Job Overview

• Job Title: Open call: The Printing Room Issue 4
• Role: Creative
• Contract: Contract
• Location: West Midlands