How AMS works
AMS assignments can range from strategic advice, proposal reviews, or brainstorm moderation to building long-term funding plans or partnerships. Compensation is tailored to a project’s size & budgetary realities. The two best practices below illustrate how AMS partnerships can work in action.
Sublime Imperfections
From 2015 to 2020, as professor at the University of Amsterdam, Ellen coordinated Sublime Imperfections – a research project that focused on practices in which imperfections and mistakes are not erased but celebrated.
For Sublime Imperfections, Ellen raised a total of €1 million in funding through an NWO VIDI grant, a Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study fellowship and in-kind support from ca. thirty curators, designers and researchers from, among others, Design Academy Eindhoven, Droog Design studio, the Rhode Island School of Design, the University of New South Wales’ School of Art & Design, the School of Design at HSE St. Petersburg, Cambridge University, and Repair Society.
Yuriko Saito
Professor Emerita of Philosophy, Rhode Island School of Design
"Working with Ellen Rutten on the Sublime Imperfections project ranks among the most delightful and productive ventures in my career. Her incisive project planning, built on commitment to justice and inclusion, helped to create an exceptionally supportive atmosphere for participants from diverse backgrounds to work collaboratively. She is a true visionary and leader."
The Sublime Imperfections team developed and took part in an active public programme, with meetings in Amsterdam, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Oxford and Stanford University, among other places. Discussions about possible collaboration with the management of the Stedelijk Museum Breda gave Ellen insight into the budgeting of academic-museum partnerships. The team also brought together scientists, artists, cultural historians, physicists, DJs, consultants, curators, artists, urban planners, carpenters, designers, diplomats, consultants and policymakers in debates, concerts and hands-on workshops for young people and local communities in Amsterdam Nieuw-West, for example.
Photos Yegor Osipov-Gipsh
Protest Appeals
In 2019, researchers from Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (SMA), Van Abbemuseum, and Ellen initiated a long-term collaboration between the University of Amsterdam, the museums, Gerrit Rietveld Academy, and the International Institute of Social History (IISG), based on shared teamwork rather than top-down partnerships.
Student excursions, joint lectures, and course programming around the museums’ Eastern-European art collections helped reduce educational workloads while producing new work with the museum collections. Through public events and cooperation within research programme Rakurs, the institutions also reached new, broader audiences.
Anonymous reviewer
Protest Appeals application review for the Netherlands Scientific Agenda
"the list of participants … is stunning in its range and diversity”; "altogether one of the most impressive grant proposals that I have ever seen."
Together with the museum directors and Heads of Collections, Ellen expanded this academy-museum partnership into a consortium of twenty European art and protest collectives, museums, research institutions, and NGOs. She was lead applicant for two grant proposals from the consortium for research into East European protest art: one for the National Research Agenda (NWA) and one for NWO VICI funding. These 'Protest Appeals' proposals, for funding up to €1.5 million, were both selected for further development, and the NWA proposal was shortlisted for an interview – a rarity for humanities proposals in the NWA. After the large-scale invasion of Ukraine, the NWA ‘Protest Appeals' application had to be halted for operational reasons, but the partnership did result in a successful NWO Museum Grant application and funding for shared outreach events. SMA, IISG, and Van Abbemuseum continue to collaborate actively with the UvA.
Photos Ellen Rutten / private archive
Divya Nadkarni
Assistant Professor Literary & Cultural Analysis, University of Amsterdam; NWO VENI Laureate
"As Ellen’s former doctoral student, I’ve had the good fortune of her guidance: from helping turn flighty new ideas into a robust project proposal to translating academic work into politically relevant collaboration. Ellen always has a finger on the pulse of funding opportunities, and is excellent at facilitating connections within and beyond academia."