Visitors 2019

Adam Sutherland is the director of Grizedale arts a rurally based organisation that operates from a small-holding in the Lake District of England. The programme is both intensely local - the immediate valley - and international with projects across the globe in both major institutions and small rural communities. The organisation works to make creativity a part of everyday life, an action rather than a product.

Recent exhibitions include 'The Land we Live in' for Hauser and Wirth, 'A Fairland' for Irish Museum of Modern Art, 'Joy Forever' Whitworth Gallery. Projects include 'The Expanded Dream of Kiwanosato' - a residency and schools programme as part of a rural development initiative, ‘The Road’ a community project to build an outdoor education park.

From the farm Lawson Park GA hosts an ongoing programme of residencies, volunteer placements and internships working to develop the land and buildings as creative and innovative ways to live.

Jamillah James is Curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (ICA, LA). Together with Margot Norton, James is co-curating the 2021 edition of the New Museum Triennial. Recent exhibitions include No Wrong Holes: Thirty Years of Nayland Blake, the most comprehensive exhibition to date of artist, educator, and curator Nayland Blake; This Has No Name, the first US survey of B. Wurtz; and solo presentations of Lucas Blalock, Maryam Jafri, Rafa Esparza, Abigail DeVille, and Sarah Cain. Prior to joining ICA LA in 2016, James was Assistant Curator at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, working in collaboration with the nonprofit Art + Practice, where she organized exhibitions of Simone Leigh, Alex Da Corte, Njideka Akunyili Crosby, among others. She has held curatorial positions at the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York; the Queens Museum, Flushing, New York; and independently organized exhibitions, performances, screenings, and public programs at alternative and artist-run spaces throughout the US and Canada since 2004.

Artist and writer Shubigi Rao makes layered installations of books, etchings, drawings, pseudo-scientific machines, metaphysical puzzles, video works, ideological board games, and archives. These often immersive and tongue-in-cheek works demonstrate her diverse interests in subjects such as archaeology, neuroscience, libraries, archival systems, histories and lies, literature and violence, ecologies, and natural history.

Her current texts, video, photographs and artworks concern ecological and human interactions through the movements of objects and language. She is currently chief curator of the 5th edition of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, 2020.

Mario D’Souza is a curator and writer. He was formerly curator at Khoj International Artists’ Association, New Delhi. His research interests include political imaginaries, the nation building project, cultures and aesthetics of dissent, public acts of assembling, legal and extra-legal systems, evidence and truth. Mario is interested in emerging contemporary practices in the ‘Global South’ aligning South East Asia, South and West Asia, Africa and South America.

In 2019, he contributed to how to reappear: through the quivering leaves of independent publishing curated by Ala Younis and Maha Maamoun at the Beirut Art Center. His exhibitions with Khoj include This Must be True, that he co-curated in 2019, along with projects like 'Evidence Room' (2017) and 'Turn of the tide' (2018). He is currently on the curatorial team for the 5th edition of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, 2020.

Shubigi Rao and Mario D’Souza are visiting Norway as part of OCA’s International Visitor Programme (IVP). OCA runs an International Visitor Programme to support international curators and cultural producers in their research in Norway for upcoming exhibitions and projects.

Iwona Blazwick has been Director of the Whitechapel Gallery since 2001 and is a curator, critic and lecturer. She was formerly at Tate Modern and London’s ICA, and has worked as an independent curator in Europe, the US and Japan.

Blazwick has curated solo shows and new commissions from some of the most significant living artists in the world, and has conceived thematic exhibitions that have shaped new art histories, including A Short History of Performance. Blazwick established the Artists Film International global consortium, and has set new precedents for the animation of collections and archives.

She is series editor of Whitechapel Gallery/MIT Documents of Contemporary Art, has written about numerous contemporary artists, and on themes and movements in modern and contemporary art, exhibition histories and art institutions.

Sonel Breslav, is the Director of Fairs & Editions at Printed Matter, Inc. the world’s leading non-profit organization dedicated to the dissemination, understanding and appreciation of artists’ books and related publications. Sonel will present a short history of Printed Matter, Inc, with a focus on the NY and LA Art Book Fairs, now entering its 14th year in production, the leading international gathering for the distribution of artists’ books, celebrating the full breadth of the art publishing community.

Natasha Ginwala is a curator and writer. She is Associate Curator at Gropius Bau, Berlin and Artistic Director of Gwangju Biennale 2020 with Defne Ayas. Ginwala has curated Contour Biennale 8, Polyphonic Worlds: Justice as Medium and was part of the curatorial team of documenta 14, 2017. Other recent projects include COLOMBOSCOPE Festival ‘Sea Change’ (2019); Arrival, Incision. Indian Modernism as Peripatetic Itinerary in the framework of “Hello World. Revising a Collection” at Hamburger Bahnhof - Museum für Gegenwart, Berlin, 2018; Riots: Slow Cancellation of the Future at ifa Gallery Berlin and Stuttgart, 2018; My East is Your West at the 56th Venice Biennale, 2015; and Corruption: Everybody Knows… with e-flux, New York, 2015. Ginwala was a member of the artistic team for the 8th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art, 2014, and has co-curated The Museum of Rhythm, at Taipei Biennial 2012 and at Muzeum Sztuki, Łódź, 2016–17. From 2013–15, in collaboration with Vivian Ziherl, she led the multi-part curatorial project Landings presented at various partner organizations. Ginwala writes on contemporary art and visual culture in various periodicals and has contributed to numerous publications. She is a recipient of the 2018 visual arts research grant from the Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe.

Defne Ayas has served as a director and curator to several cultural institutions and research initiatives across the world, including the Netherlands, China, the United States and Russia. Ayas was the director of Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art in Rotterdam (2012-2017). Currently, Ayas is the Artistic Co-Director of the Gwangju Biennale 2020 (w/Natasha Ginwala) and works as a Curator at Large at V-A-C Foundation in Moscow. She has served as curator of the Pavilion of Turkey in the 56th Venice Biennale (2015); co-curator of the 6th Moscow Biennale (2015); co-curator of the 11th Baltic Triennial (2012), and curator of New York-based Performa since 2005.

Jacopo Crivelli Visconti is a curator and art critic. He holds a PhD in architecture from the Universidade de São Paulo (USP), and was a member of the team of the Fundação Bienal de São Paulo from 2001 to 2009, when he curated the official Brazilian participation at the 52nd International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia (2007). His recent works include: Untimely, Again, Pavilion of the Republic of Chipre at the 58th Biennale di Venezia, Italy (2019); Brasile – Il coltello nella carne, PAC – Padiglione d’arte contemporanea, Milan, Italy (2018); Matriz do tempo real, Museu de Arte Contemporânea of the Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil (2018); Memories of Underdevelopment, Museum of Contemporary Art of San Diego, USA (2017); Héctor Zamora – Dinâmica não linear, Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, São Paulo, Brazil (2016); Sean Scully, Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, Brazil (2015); and Ir para volver, 12th Bienal de Cuenca, Ecuador (2014). He is the author of the book Novas derivas (WMF Martins Fontes, São Paulo, Brazil, 2014; Ediciones Metales Pesados, Santiago, Chile, 2016). He regularly collaborates with publications on contemporary art, architecture and design, contributes to exhibition catalogs, and writes monographs on artists.

Fernanda Brenner is a curator. She is the founder and artistic director of Pivô, a non profit art space in São Paulo. Recent exhibitions include A Burrice dos Homens (2019) Bergamin Gomide Gallery, São Paulo, Neither (2017) and Nightfall (2018) , Mendes Wood DM , Brussels and Black Box (2018) at Fundação Iberê Camargo, Porto Alegre. She is a contributing editor for Frieze Magazine and her writings featured in number of publications and catalogues, such as Artreview, Mousse, Cahiers d’Art and The Exhibitionist, where she is part of the editorial board.

Jaimie Isaac is a curator and interdisciplinary artist. Jaimie works inside and outside institutional systems to create space for underrepresented groups to challenge the canon and expand contemporary and art historical narratives. Her interests in social engagement are present within her exhibitions. Isaac’s thesis research focus was about Decolonizing Curatorial Practice.

Alexie Glass-Kantor is Executive Director of Artspace, Sydney, supporting the commissioning of contemporary art, publishing initiatives, and research residencies for artists and curators. She is the Curator for the Encounters sector at Art Basel, Hong Kong (2015—ongoing), which is the curated sector for the presentation of large-scale installations. Since 2000 she has curated or co-curated over one hundred exhibitions across independent spaces, collecting institutions, biennials and festivals, facilitating international artists across generations to develop projects. Instigating collaborative international curatorial projects throughout her career, Glass-Kantor has overseen curatorial projects with organizations including: Art Sonje Centre, South Korea; Proto Cinema, Turkey; Museum of Contemporary Art & Design, Philippines; Kunsthalle Tbilisi, Georgia; Dhaka Art Summit, Bangladesh; Performa15 and Printed Matter Inc., New York; Institute of Contemporary Arts and Chisenhale Gallery, London; Iberia Centre for Contemporary Art, Beijing; NUS Museum, National University of Singapore; 13th SITE Santa Fe Biennial, New Mexico; and Melbourne International Arts Festival with MONA FOMA, Hobart. In collaboration with Natasha Bullock, Glass-Kantor co-curated Parallel Collisions: 12th Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art at the Art Gallery of South Australia (AGSA), in 2012. Prior to her appointment to Artspace she was Director–Senior Curator, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne, and at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, Melbourne. Since 2015, Glass-Kantor is the Chair of the Contemporary Art Organisations of Australia and is currently serving on boards including: Board Director, Museum of Contemporary Art & Design, De La Salle College of Saint Benilde, Manila; Academic Board, National Art School, Sydney; Jury Member, Advance Global Awards 2018 and 2019; and Council Member, Sydney Culture Network. She regularly jury’s art award and prizes, alongside a program of participating in public programs and symposiums and delivering lectures across Australia and internationally.

Laura McLean-Ferris is a writer and Curator at Swiss Institute, New York, where she has curated numerous projects with artists including Cally Spooner, Alex Baczynski-Jenkins, Olga Balema, Aria Dean, Irena Haiduk, Nancy Lupo and Studio for Propositional Cinema. As a writer, she is a regular contributor to Artforum, ArtReview, Art-Agenda, Even, frieze, Mousse, and Flash Art International, and has authored catalogue essays for monographs on the work of Nina Beier, Anna-Sophie Berger, Deimantas Narkevičius, Rachel Rose and Hayley Tompkins. Other recent exhibitions include Our Lacustrine Cities at Chapter NY, New York (2015) and The Forecast at Croy Nielsen, Vienna (2017). She was the recipient of the 2015 Creative Capital | Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant for short-form writing and her short-form collection The Lacustrine was published in 2016.

Brook Andrew is an interdisciplinary artist who examines dominant narratives, often relating to colonialism and the restitution of cultural objects to their original communities. Through museum and archival research and interventions, he aims to offer alternate versions of forgotten histories; illustrating different means for interpreting history in the world today. Apart from drawing inspiration from vernacular objects and the archive he travels internationally to work with communities and various private and public collections to tease out new interpretations.

Most recently Brook presented Ahy-kon-uh-klas-tik, an interrogation of the Van Abbemuseum archives in Holland, which re-imagines a different world timeline alongside his own archive curated by Nick Aikens. In 2017 he also created an intervention into the collection of the Musée d'ethnographie de Genève, Switzerland; and The Right to Offend is Sacredopened at the National Gallery of Victoria, a 25-year reflection on his practice. Across October and November 2017, Brook will complete a Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship, with the Smithsonian Institute, USA; and in 2018 present What’s Left Behind, a new commission for SUPERPOSITION: Art of Equilibrium and Engagementat the 21st Biennale of Sydney.

His recent research includes an ambitious international comparative three-year Federal Government Australian Research Council grant titled Representation, Remembrance and the Memorial. The project is designed to respond to the repeated high-level calls for a national memorial to Aboriginal loss and the frontier wars: www.rr.memorial.

Brook is currently the Artistic Director for the 22nd Biennale of Sydney opening March 2020, which is the 250 year anniversary that Captain James Cook claimed to have discovered Australia for the British monarch.

Oswaldo Maciá creates olfactory-acoustic sculptures that have been exhibited all over the world. His work is held in international collections, including Tate Britain and Daros Latinamerica.

His sculptures have been included in numerous large-scale periodic exhibitions and solo presentations across four continents. As he states in his manifesto, Maciá seeks to stimulate questions and counter received opinion. In 2015 Maciá won a major public commission for the city of Bogotá selected by an international jury. Scenario in Construction is the first public sound sculpture of in the southern hemisphere. In 1976 he attended the School of Fine Arts in Cartagena at the age of 16, graduating in 1980.

In 1982 he moved to the capital Bogotá to study advertising at Jorge Tadeo Lozano University, and left after five semesters to become a full-time artist. Maciá taught Fine Art at Jorge Tadeo Lozano University from 1985 before moving to Barcelona in 1989, where he studied Mural Painting at Llotja School of Fine Art. In 1990 Maciá moved to London, where he continues to run a studio.

He studied BA in Sculpture between 1990 and 1993 at Guildhall University followed in 1994 by Masters in Fine Art at Goldsmiths College, University of London. In the 1990s his work featured in solo exhibitions in London venues at the forefront of defining installation art, including the Museum of Installation and Clove Gallery, and group exhibitions such as Ideal Standard Summertime at Lisson Gallery.

Zachary Kaplan is Executive Director of Rhizome, the leading born-digital art institution and longtime affiliate of the New Museum in New York City. Since 1996, Rhizome has championed born-digital art and culture through innovative exhibition, commissions, preservation, and software development programs.

During Kaplan's tenure, the organization has broadened its artistic and preservation programs. In 2016, Rhizome launched Net Art Anthology, a retelling of net art history through 100 works that define the field—which will come to a close with an exhibition opening at the New Museum in January 2019, and the release of a new publication. That same year, the organization founded the Webrecorder initiative, a major software development project to create open-source tools to easily archive and share complex, interactive websites. Recently, Rhizome's flagship art-tech program Seven on Seven, which pairs leading artists and technologists in to create new interdisciplinary projects, celebrated its 10th anniversary and saw its first China-based edition.

Before Rhizome, Kaplan worked at the Renaissance Society in Chicago and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.