For artists
The portfolio an open call asks for, and how to make it in an evening
An open call portfolio is usually eight to fifteen images of recent work, one per page, each captioned with title, year, medium and dimensions, and never a price. Samlio builds that PDF from the works you choose in your archive, with each image reduced to 1,600 pixels on the long edge. Atelier, the free plan, includes it.
What goes in an open call portfolio?
Images of your work, one to a page, with a caption under each. Around the portfolio, most calls ask for a CV and an artist statement. Residencies and grants usually want a project proposal in place of the statement, and some add a budget.
The proportions change from call to call, even under one roof. Cité internationale des arts in Paris caps the portfolio at fifteen pages in both its residency calls, but In Situ asked for a CV of four pages and a letter of intent of four, while Art Explora wants a CV of two and a project description of two. The Villa Medici in Rome caps the whole online application at 20 MB. Read the call’s limits before you choose a single work.
How many images should an open call portfolio have?
As many as the call allows, and often fewer. Where no number is given, ten to twelve works shown one to a page are read more generously than twenty squeezed together. A tight sequence also shows a jury that you can edit your own work.
Juried exhibitions are stricter. The annual society exhibitions at Mall Galleries in London accept up to six works per artist and hang at most three or four of them. Several prizes only accept work made in the last two, three or five years, so choose recent work unless the call asks for something else.
What should the caption under each work say?
Title, year, medium, dimensions, in that order. Height before width, in centimetres for a European call.
Harbour at Low Water, 2025, oil on linen, 120 × 90 cm
Consistency matters more than detail. “Approx. 1 m” on one page and exact measurements on the next tells a jury the record was put together the night before.
What file format and size do open calls accept?
Whatever the form states, to the megabyte. A total limit, like the Villa Medici’s 20 MB, covers everything you send, not each image.
For a PDF, one work per page with the caption underneath reads well on a screen and survives being printed for a jury meeting. For forms that want images one at a time, a JPEG of about 2,000 pixels on the long edge is a sound default, named so that image four matches caption four. The image naming guide has the pattern.
Then open the finished file on a phone. If a detail you care about disappears there, it disappears for a juror reading on a train.
Should an open call portfolio include prices?
No. A price on a caption makes a jury read the number before the work, and an insurance value cannot be taken back once it sits in a stranger’s inbox. The same goes for the names of people who own your work. When a sales exhibition does need a price, it belongs in the entry form.
How does Samlio make the portfolio?
Samlio is an archive for your own work. Each work keeps its photographs, title, year, medium, dimensions and your notes. When a deadline comes up, you select the works in your archive in the order you want them seen, press Export and choose Portfolio. You get a PDF with:
- A cover with what it is for (“Villa Medici Fellows 2027”), your name, the number of works and the date.
- One work per page, the image first, with title, year, medium and dimensions underneath.
- The works in the order you chose them. Each one shows its number as you select it, and you can move a work up or down before the file is made.
- No price, valuation or owner. The portfolio format has no place for them.
- Each image reduced to 1,600 pixels on the long edge before it is placed. If the finished file is larger than 15 MB, Samlio tells you before you download it.
- Your notes on each work, only if you tick the box.
- A file name made of your name and the title, so it reads like a person chose it.
The only Samlio mark is a small imprint on the cover. The pages with your work carry your work.
The same selection can also become a list of works, a table with values for insurance or an estate, or a consignment list with sale prices, terms and a line for each side to sign when work goes to a gallery. Those two are for your records and your gallery. Only the portfolio is for a jury.
What does the export leave to you?
A portfolio is one file among several, and the export does one job. It is worth knowing the edges before a deadline:
- It does not write your CV, statement or proposal. Most forms want those as separate uploads anyway.
- It does not make separate image files for forms that take images one by one.
- Each work is shown with its first photograph. You choose which one that is by dragging the photographs into order on the work itself.
- Dimensions print as height × width in centimetres. Depth and edition numbers have no field of their own, so for sculpture or prints, write them into the medium line.
Check the call’s own requirements before you send. Page limits, file size and naming vary, and no two calls ask for quite the same thing.
What does it cost?
The portfolio export is part of every plan, including the free one.
- Atelier, free: up to 15 works and 3 collections. Fifteen works is the length of most portfolios. No card needed.
- Archive, 7 € a month or 59 € a year: 100 works, 10 collections.
- Studio, 12 € a month or 109 € a year: no limit on works or collections.
Prices are plus VAT where it applies. All plans.
Applying without an account?
Everything on this page works without Samlio. These are free and need no sign-up:
- Open call application checklist: what to read first, which files to prepare, and what to check before you press submit. PDF or Word.
- How to name and size image files: one naming pattern and the sizes most forms accept.
- Artwork list template: one row per work, in Excel or CSV. The caption for every work is already in it.
- How to put together a portfolio for an open call or grant: the longer guide, with sequencing and what changes between a prize, a residency and a grant.
- How to photograph your artwork properly.
And the calls themselves: open calls and residencies across Europe, each with its deadline, fee and a link to the organiser’s own page.
Open calls and residencies, in your inbox every other week.
A short letter from Rebecka every other Tuesday: three open calls worth your evening, who each one is really for, and the one she would apply to herself. Unsubscribe in one click.
Questions
- How many images should an open call portfolio have?
- As many as the call allows, and often fewer. Where no number is given, ten to twelve works, one per page, is enough. Juried exhibitions often set a hard limit; the society exhibitions at Mall Galleries in London accept up to six works per artist and select at most three or four.
- Should I put prices in my open call portfolio?
- No. Prices, insurance values and the names of owners stay out of a submission portfolio. If a sales exhibition needs a price, it goes in the entry form. Samlio's portfolio export leaves them out by design.
- What file format do open calls accept for a portfolio?
- Usually a single PDF, or separate JPEGs, and the form states which. For a PDF, put one work per page with its caption. For separate images, about 2,000 pixels on the long edge is a sound default. Always keep within the call's total file size.
- Can I reuse the same portfolio for different applications?
- Keep one pool of works and make a new selection each time. A prize, a residency and a grant judge different things, so the choice of works should change even when the archive stays the same. In Samlio each export is a new selection with its own title.
- Is Samlio's portfolio export free?
- Yes. It is included in Atelier, the free plan, which holds up to 15 works. Paid plans start at 7 € a month for 100 works and change only how many works and collections you can keep.