Photo Digital Technician

The Department of Art History, Visual Art, and Theory (AHVA) at the University of British Columbia invites applications for the CUPE 116 Photo Digital Technician role with an anticipated start date in August 2026. This position is full time and offers a $69,240 annual salary plus benefits.

Job Summary

The Photo Digital Technician contributes to the instruction, practice, and research of photography for the Department of Art History, Visual Art & Theory (AHVAT). Major responsibilities include: overseeing daily operations of photography facilities; ensuring the safe use, maintenance, and supervision of photographic facilities and equipment, orienting students at all levels in studio, darkroom and digital imaging practices; performance of highly skilled technical tasks requiring education, training and experience in the field of photography; and working collaboratively with colleagues to support delivery of the visual art curriculum with an emphasis on photography.

The department is housed in several buildings at UBC Vancouver campus: the Frederic Lasserre Building, Auditorium Annex A, Wesbrook Building, B.C. Binning Studios, Dorothy Somerset Studios, and the Audain Art Centre. Based at BC Binning studios, the Technician interacts frequently with AHVA’s Visual Art faculty, sessional lecturers, staff, undergraduate and graduate students.

Organizational Status

Reports to the Senior Manager, Administration and Manager, Studios, Exhibitions, and Facilities; works directly with all Visual Art faculty and technical staff; liaises and collaborates with Art History faculty and fellow staff in the department as well as colleagues in Arts ISIT, Information Technology (IT), Facilities Management, Safety & Risk Services, and Building Operations.

Minimum Qualifications

• Completion of a university degree in a relevant discipline or technical program and a minimum four years of related experience or an equivalent combination of education and experience. Some positions may require a graduate degree
• Willingness to respect diverse perspectives, including perspectives in conflict with one’s own
• Demonstrates a commitment to enhancing one’s own awareness, knowledge, and skills related to equity, diversity, and inclusion

Preferred Qualifications

• University degree or technical college training of at least three years in both technical and creative aspects of photography, including a demonstrated knowledge of darkroom printing processes and other advanced techniques.
• A thorough understanding of both field and studio equipment and techniques, including 35mm, large format cameras and lighting.
• Knowledge of computer hardware and software for digital imaging, including Adobe Creative Suite.
• Working knowledge of some, or all, of the following core equipment: digital cameras, lighting equipment, scanners, large format printers, projectors, monitors, macOS/Windows/Linux platforms, etc.
• Ability to coordinate and oversee work processes.
• Ability to effectively use spreadsheets, word processing, calendar, communication and email applications at a basic level (e.g., Outlook, Teams, Word, Excel, PowerPoint) in a PC/Mac environment.
• Ability to communicate effectively both verbally and in writing.

Equity and diversity are essential to academic excellence. An open and diverse community fosters the inclusion of voices that have been underrepresented or discouraged. We encourage applications from members of groups that have been marginalized on any grounds enumerated under the B.C. Human Rights Code, including sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, racialization, disability, political belief, religion, marital or family status, age, and/or status as a First Nation, Metis, Inuit, and/or Indigenous person.

All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply; however, Canadians and permanent residents will be given priority.

Please refer to the full posting and apply online at https://ubc.wd10.myworkdayjobs.com/ubcstaffjobs/job/UBC-Vancouver-Campus—Vancouver-BC-Canada/Photo-Digital-Technician_JR25460-1 under JOB ID JR25460.

Applications close at midnight on Monday, August 10, 2026. Inquiries to Andrea Tuele, Administrator, andrea.tuele@ubc.ca.

2026-2027 AHVA Student Work Learn Positions

Complement your studies in Art History, Visual Art, and Curatorial Studies this academic year through a paid Work Learn position in the Department of Art History, Visual Art and Theory (AHVA). The department has several Work Learn opportunities that support the research and operations of AHVA, and are open to all eligible UBC students.

For more information and to apply please see the full job postings, application requirements, and deadlines at UBC Career Services:https://students.ubc.ca/career and click on CareersOnline.

All positions are now live on CareersOnline until August 12, 2026

Workshop Painting & Install Assistant (Job ID: 1009243)

Workshop Operations Assistant (Job ID: 1009242)

Studio and Safety Assistant (Job ID: 1009222)

Photo Digital Assistant (Job ID: 1009659)

Photo Equipment Cage Assistant (Job ID: 1009230)

Photo Studio Assistant (Job ID: 1009214)

Darkroom Assistant (Job ID: 1009225)

Printmaking Studio Assistant (Job ID: 1009127)

New Media Technical Assistant (Job ID: 1009234)

AHVA Collections Project Assistant (Job ID: 1009599)

AHVA Visual Resources Project Assistant (Job ID: 1009584)

Gallery Monitor & Exhibition Assistant (Job ID: 1009205)

Graphics/Media Production & Gallery Assistant (Job ID: 1009673)

Positions will remain open until filled, but please apply ASAP! It is anticipated that many of the studio positions will not be filled until September.

Yuan Wen

Rebecca Wang

Mahsa Farzi

Solange Adum Abdala

2026-2027 AHVA TA Postings

ARTH TA Postings 2026W
VISA TA Postings 2026W

Application: Please upload copies of the following by 4:30 PM on Thursday, 30 April 2026.

1)Cover letter indicating the course(s) you are applying for and preference;
2)Curriculum vitae, which includes a list of all Art History/Visual Art courses that you will have completed by August 31, 2026.

-Tutorial times can range between 9:00 am – 8:00 pm
-Students must be in British Columbia by the start date of a TA assignment in order to hold the appointment

UBC hires on the basis of merit and is committed to employment equity. We encourage all qualified applicants to apply. Successful applicants will become members of the Teaching Assistant union, CUPE 2278. Assignment of positions is guided by the stipulations within the collective agreement between UBC and CUPE 2278.

Manga Matrix

Dan Starling, Manga Matrix, 2026.

Book information:

Books is pleased to announce the launch of Manga Matrix, a comic/manga artist book by Dan Starling, with contributions from Steffanie Ling, Deanna Li, Wake Cook, Siqi Yang, Tajliya Jamal, Natalia Soto, and Kobie Gingras-Fox. The book is risograph printed by Moniker Press.

Manga Matrix is inspired by the need for new post-colonial and post-patriarchal narratives that break with the conventions of storytelling in popular media and propose a new way to imagine ourselves individually and collectively. The starting point for the work is the narrative story arc of the hero’s journey and its persistent use in popular culture. To overcome this simplistic yet stubborn mythology, Manga Matrix seeks to maintain a state of tension in which conflict doesn’t resolve in an overly simplistic manner, realist conventions don’t suppress artifice, actions do not flow seamlessly, and interruption is the norm. The “conclusion” of the book consists of a series of lithographic prints that begin as representations but progressively become more and more layered with abstract images, obliterating the narrative and eventually becoming saturated with black ink so that the hero’s journey “stops being written”.

For more information: https://libby.ecuad.ca/programme/manga-matrix/

Art and Feminisms: Histories, Methods, and Legacies

Erin Silver, Art and Feminisms: Histories, Methods, and Legacies (Routledge, 2026).

Book information:

Through an international cohort of contributors, this book examines the rich and diverse strands of artistic and cultural production from the nineteenth century to the present day that contribute to elastic and ever-expanding histories of feminist art.

The contributions facilitate an understanding of the complex histories of feminist art, material, and cultural production for both new and inveterate students and scholars, while complicating feminist art’s canonization by engaging questions and issues of history-writing itself. An implicit concern throughout the volume is how feminist art history has both addressed and, at times, been complicit in its own systems of exclusion. Foregrounding political and social movements and developments in related fields such as critical race studies, Indigenous studies, trans studies, disability studies, and critical ethnic studies in recent decades, this volume looks beyond the canonical lineage of feminist art history toward an expansive view of feminist art’s pasts, pitfalls, and potentials. The book also goes beyond the traditional visual arts to consider vernacular and material cultures in our increasingly visually oriented world (which encompasses the social media and citizen journalism accelerated in the COVID era).

The book will be of interest to scholars and students working in art history and gender studies.

For more information: https://www.routledge.com/Art-and-Feminisms-Histories-Methods-and-Legacies/Silver/p/book/9781032117980

League Play Book

Germaine Koh and Simona Dolinská, eds., League Play Book (Nanaimo Art Gallery, 2025).

Book Information:

League Play Book serves both as documentation of Germaine Koh’s ongoing League project focused on play as a creative practice, and as a kind of workbook that could inspire more invention.

The book is released in free digital edition and a limited-edition bookwork. It is sized for a standard North American three-hole binder, and the bookwork with custom binding is in an edition of 200. Read and download the free PDF at https://germainekoh.com/league-play-book-2025.pdf.

The book is arranged into three sections: Analysis, Plays, and Practice.

The short essays of the Analysis section are written by artists, athletes, scholars, game designers and players who have intimate, lived understanding of the processes of invention and discovery that can develop through play. They share their experiences of the anatomy and dynamics of ingenuity; the culturally radical potential of play; creative mindsets; psychological and cognitive processing; and the situations and settings for discovery. Some analyze the mechanics of how invention and decision-making happen in their fields. Others address how play works to create possibility by revising conventions.

Jesse Birch writes on learning through mimicry in skateboarding, Koh proposes vulnerability and uncertainty as key elements. League collaborator Bruce Emmett shares his recollections of how innovation unfolded at League events in conversation with objects and places. Considering the production of artworks, James Long looks at virtuosic plays of implicit meaning, while Eliot White-Hill narrates his development of work in relation to the traditional forms of his Coast Salish heritage. Revising social conventions, Simona Dolinská describes the potential of neurodivergent play and Elizabeth Nijdam considers critical play. Focusing closely on decision-making, Ian Verchère analyzes the mechanics of progression in games and action sports, Lindsey Freeman writes on the mind games of distance running, and Meaghan Hackinen traces some decision-making in emergent sport.

The Plays section collects case studies written by participants, which outline the creative processes that produced some of League’s events and products. These are not recipes, but they do try to identify the key ingredients, conditions and prompts that encouraged creative decisions.

The Practice section includes worksheets, rooms for notes, and space for users to record their own plays.

For more information: https://league.germainekoh.com/blog/?p=7349