The CCA is opening its doors to researchers looking to engage in meaningful exchange anchored by the holdings of our Collection. A sabbatical is a period of research, creation, mobility, and dialogue. While the CCA is always open to researchers, the Sabbatical@CCA Program offers a more structured form of engagement that incorporates an emphasis on the curatorial potential of in-progress research projects. In addition to dedicated office space, access to our Collection, and tailored research assistance with CCA Reference librarians, the Sabbatical@CCA Fellow will develop a reading of a cross-cutting theme that engages objects in the CCA Collection, with support from the CCA’s Public and Curatorial divisions.

The transversal format is meant to foreground publicly accessible ways of engaging with contemporary themes through archival and other forms of research. It involves selecting CCA Collection objects that can be activated through open discussions and/or public events that draw connections across time periods and geographies, and can also include reflections on the role of the subjectivity of the researcher themselves. Throughout their time at the CCA, Fellows will principally pursue their sabbatical goals, but will also have the added benefit of incorporating this stream of curatorial thinking, workshopping, and iterative making related to their research project that will culminate in this direct form of public engagement.

The CCA Collection is a repository of ideas, provocations, inspirations, and trials and errors. It provides a base of material for our curatorial activities, and is an important source for research and reflection on architecture and society. Sabbatical@CCA Fellows are invited to think and work alongside us.

The Collection documents the culture and production of architecture worldwide from the Renaissance through to the present day. It is made up of interrelated bodies of primary and secondary materials, including over two hundred full or project archives of architects and critics working in the fields of architecture, urbanism, and landscape design of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries; a wide ranging, international range of publications and periodicals, as well as building treatises, trade catalogues, city guides and maps, contemporary monographs, and websites; roughly 30,000 prints and drawings dating from the late fifteenth century to the present; over 65,000 photographs dating from the 1840s to today, including daguerreotypes, panoramas, albums, large-scale contemporary images, and new digital prints, some of which are the product of CCA commissions; artifacts, including toys, games and building blocks, souvenirs, postcards, and other printed ephemera; and audiovisual materials and digital files, including those that are parts of archives or that result from oral histories, lectures, and CCA events. As a research-driven collection it has been assembled with the aim of conserving the documents of individual practitioners, offices, critics, or historians whose work has significant resonance. Mainly encompassing the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, the archives not only include the fields of architecture, urbanism, and landscape design, but also photography, architects’ libraries, and research papers.

The CCA Collection is thus unique in the sense that no limitations have ever been set in terms of time and geography in bringing material together. It shows the diverse ways in which architecture has been imagined, conceived, observed, and transformed for the past six centuries, containing a palette of narratives and stories. It can be described and read in many ways and from various critical angles. Researchers can approach the Collection chronologically, thematically, based on medium, or from a monographic perspective. This is the invitation at the core of the Sabbatical@CCA Program—to identify transversal movements through our Collection that reflect and engage in tandem with contemporary research questions.

Every effort will be made to offer each fellow a residency period that aligns with their sabbatical timeline. Each fellow will receive a 3000 CAD mobility stipend that can be used to offset the costs of travel to and from Montreal and/or to support research travel elsewhere.

Two fellowships are available for 2026–2027 Sabbatical@CCA Program. Applications (in English or French) must include:

• a proposal (750–1,000 words) addressing how the sabbatical’s principal research project could find a new articulation as a thematic reading of the CCA Collection that is creative and transversal, which areas of the Collection are of particular interest, and what this novel layer of public facing engagement offers. We strongly encourage applicants with research projects based on recent acquisitions to check and confirm availability with ref@cca.qc.ca before submitting their project proposals.
• an abstract of the research proposal (250 words)
• a brief project schedule (300 words) that outlines key milestones for the duration of the sabbatical period, including planned research visits outside of Montreal
• a curriculum vitae
• a short biography (80–100 words)
• one representative and completed research outcome (article, exhibition, etc.)
• the names of two potential referees. Letters of recommendation are not required at the time of application and will only be requested in the case of shortlisted applicants.

Candidates for the 2026–2027 Sabbatical@CCA are invited to submit an application online through the CCA application portal.

Deadline: 1 December 2025 (11:59pm EST)

Sabbatical@CCA Fellows are selected by the CCA Curatorial Committee. The CCA Curatorial Committee will meet in December 2025 to select candidates. The results will be communicated at the end of December 2025.

For questions regarding the program, please contact studium@cca.qc.ca.

For updates on the Sabbatical@CCA, please subscribe to the CCA newsletter.