Artist CV Template for Photographers

A photographer CV should distinguish clearly between exhibition practice and commercial work. Galleries and curators want to see the artistic trajectory: solo exhibitions, group exhibitions, residencies, education, awards, collections and press. Commercial assignments, client jobs and editorial commissions can be relevant, but they should not blur the line between professional services and exhibition-based practice.

Press and publications matter especially for photographers because the medium often appears in both art and editorial contexts. Use the CV to separate coverage of your art practice from magazine work, commercial features or assigned editorial shoots. That distinction helps the reader understand what belongs to the exhibition record and what belongs to the professional service side of the practice.

Screenings may also be important for photographers whose work crosses into moving image, slide-based presentation or festival contexts. If the work has been shown in screenings, festivals or curated time-based presentations, list those entries where they belong so the CV reflects the full scope of the practice without confusing it with exhibitions or commissions.

The order below is the one most galleries expect for a photographer CV: solo exhibitions, group exhibitions, residencies, education, awards, collections and press. Keep the order stable across all submissions so the document reads as a professional record rather than a mixed résumé.

For exhibition entries, list the venue, city and year consistently. If the work belongs to a particular series or editorial body of work, keep the title consistent across entries when that naming is how the project is publicly presented. That makes it easier for a curator to connect the exhibition history to the images they are reviewing.

For photographers who have both commercial and exhibition practices, keep the separation explicit. Commercial campaigns, client commissions and editorial assignments can be listed if they are genuinely relevant, but they should never make the exhibition record harder to read. The CV should make it obvious what is art practice, what is publication-based, and what is service work.

In a portfolio PDF, the CV usually appears after the biography and before the images or selected works. That keeps the narrative clean: the reader sees who you are, then your professional record, then the work itself. MyArtPDF keeps that structure consistent so photographers can use the same content for galleries, portfolios and applications.

Once the CV is assembled, it can be reused across submissions without reformatting. That matters for photographers because their careers often span exhibitions, editorial work and commercial assignments, and those contexts may need different emphasis depending on the audience. A clean CV gives you a stable professional base.

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