Easily get essays for sale online at the best prices for any subject

INDEPENDENT CURATORS INTERNATIONAL
collaborator

Spotlight: Martha Wilson

Posted on September 4, 2015

MW

Martha Wilson, A Portfolio of Models – The Goddess 1974, black and white gelatin silver print.

Martha Wilson is a pioneering feminist, artist, founder of the experimental artist-run space Franklin Furnace, and an ICI collaborator since the early days of ICI. Just three years after ICI was established, and at the same time as Wilson founded the alternative space Franklin Furnace, ICI produced Artists’ Books U.S.A, a unique survey exhibition of artists’ publications, co-curated by Wilson and Peter Frank. The show included well over a hundred examples of book art – showing a broad range of attitudes towards publishing, from ad-hoc to ephemeral, experimental to activist. From 1978 to 1980, it expanded the often informal distribution of these publications, reaching broad audiences in art spaces across North America.

Thirty years later, in 2008, ICI and Wilson, together with curator Peter Dykhuis, began working together on an evolving retrospective exhibition of her work, that would present her practice through various entry-points, in 8 art spaces internationally from 2010 to 2015.

MWSB

Spread in Martha Wilson Sourcebook: 40 Years of Reconsidering Performance, Feminism, Alternative Spaces

At the same time, ICI published Martha Wilson Sourcebook: 40 Years of Reconsidering Performance, Feminism, Alternative Spaces in 2011, the first publication in ICI’s Sourcebook series.

Earlier this year, ICI’s Alaina Claire Feldman worked together with Wilson to present Performing Franklin Furnace – a series of performances held at Participant Inc., New York, which captured the spirit of Franklin Furnace as a physical space, and was organized to coincide with the final presentation of Martha Wilson, the exhibition.

Coco Fusco

Coco Fusco performing Observations of Predation in Humans: A lecture by Dr. Zira as part of Performing Franklin Furnace. Participant Inc., New York, NY; February 27, 2015. Photo credIt: Heather Jones.

ICI’s first collaboration with Wilson in 1978 prompted a focus on independent publishing which has lasted over the last four decades and continues in many of ICI’s Hub events in support of independent publishing. Similarly, ICI’s work on Wilson’s performance practice is inscribed in a series of exhibitions and programs that have addressed performance in diverse ways in the last five years, including do itPerformance NowEN MAS’, among other events and training programs such as the Curatorial Intensive.

ICI 2015 HONOREES

 ICI 2015 HONOREES

Posted on September 17, 2015

For the last 25 years, ICI has recognized the individuals who pave the way for a forward-thinking generation of curators and artists, and those curators who have moved the field’s boundaries ahead. At the 40th Anniversary Benefit & Auction, ICI will honor Michael Govan, Wallis Annenberg Director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), with the Leo Award; and Beatrix Ruf, curator and the Director of the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, with The Agnes Gund Curatorial Award.

THE LEO AWARD

The Leo Award (established in 1990) named after the late, renowned art dealer Leo Castelli, was created to recognize outstanding achievements in advancing the field of contemporary art, and the contributions of pioneering individuals who foster new opportunities and supportive environments for curators and artists. Past recipients of the Leo Award include Dimitris DaskalopoulosRoy and Dorothy LichtensteinMiuccia Prada, and Dasha Zhukova.

This year, as ICI celebrates 40 years of commitment to curators and contemporary art, we pay homage to Michael Govan, CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director of LACMA. For more than 25 years, Govan has been in the leadership of major art institutions in the U.S., and has played a significant part in the changing role of art museums in American life. Amid considerable transformations in the artistic and curatorial fields, and in the arts funding landscape, he has come to represent a leading force dedicated to the support of artists, contemporary art and curatorial practice, and audience engagement.

From 1994 to 2006, Govan was President and Director of Dia Art Foundation in New York City, where he significantly enlarged the collection, and spearheaded the creation of Dia:Beacon in the Hudson Valley. Since he became director of LACMA in 2006, he has overseen a period of unprecedented expansion of the museum’s campus, and of its audience. Govan and his team have raised LACMA’s international profile, while firmly positioning it as a cultural and civic center for Los Angeles. He also set as an early priority his vision to have contemporary artists interact with the museum’s historic collections, through commissions and artist-curated exhibitions.

THE AGNES GUND CURATORIAL AWARD

The Agnes Gund Curatorial Award honors a curator who has made an outstanding contribution to the presentation and discourse of contemporary art. The “Aggie” Award was named after ICI Trustee Emerita Agnes Gund in recognition of her long-standing dedication to ICI, to contemporary art, and to the curatorial field. Past recipients of the Agnes Gund Curatorial Award include Germano CelantLynne CookeOkwui EnwezorRoselee GoldbergAlanna HeissMatthew Higgs, and Robert Storr. The 2015 Agnes Gund Curatorial Award will be presented to Beatrix Ruf, curator and Director of the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.

Throughout her career, Ruf has shown unwavering support of artists, helping define many careers. She has followed her trust in the experimental, and consistently nurtured emerging art practice, giving several young artists their first museum exhibitions and commissioning them for new art installations. Through key survey exhibitions, she has also inscribed more established artists such as Sturtevant, Isa Genzken, Rosemarie Trockel, Laura Owens, Yang Fudong and Ian Wallace in an art historical arc.

Like many curators in recent years, Ruf has also worked towards building strong infrastructures for contemporary art practice. From 2001 to 2014, she ran the Kunsthalle Zürich, where she initiated an extensive building expansion while also developing a distinguished exhibitions program.

Ruf believes in the importance of fostering art discourse, and as such she served as a Board Member of JRP|Ringier, one of the world’s leading contemporary art publishing houses, for many years. Committed to institutional cooperation across borders, Ruf often worked within a network of prominent European institutions including the Centre Pompidou in Paris, Tate Liverpool, the Ludwig Museum in Cologne, the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven, and Moderna Museet in Stockholm. Since 2014, she has been the Director of the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.

The 2015 Leo Award and the 2015 Agnes Gund Curatorial Award will be presented at ICI’s 40th Anniversary Benefit & Auction in New York City on November 18.

LACMA’s Michael Govan is ICI’s 2015 Leo Award Winner – Blouin ArtInfo Blogs

Posted on September 22, 2015

ArtInfo covers the announcement of Michael Govan as ICI’s 2015 Leo Award Recipient.

Download the full article here.

ArtReview on Michael Govan and Leo Award

Posted on

ArtReview on Michael Govan receiving ICI’s 2015 Leo Award.

Download the full article here.

ARTNEWS: Michael Govan Announced as Recipient of ICI’s 2015 Leo Award

Posted on

Hannah Ghorashi covers the announcement of Michael Govan as recipient of ICI’s 2015 Leo Award for ARTNews.

Read the full article here.

Los Angeles Times on Michael Govan and Leo Award

Posted on

Jessica Gelt writes on Michael Govan and ICI’s 2015 Leo Award for the Los Angeles Times.

Download the full article here.

Beatrix Ruf wins the “Aggie”

Posted on

Ruf

Ryan Steadman on Beatrix Ruf, recipient of ICI’s 2015 Agnes Gund Curatorial Award.

Read the full article here.

ARTFORUM: Beatrix Ruf Wins ICI’s Agnes Gund Award

Posted on September 23, 2015

Curator Beatrix Ruf will receive the Agnes Gund Award this year from Independent Curators International. Meanwhile, the Leo Award will be given to Michael Govan, CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director of LACMA.

Read the full article here.

ARTNews: Beatrix Ruf, Agnes Gund Curatorial Award

Posted on

Beatrix Ruf, the director of Amsterdam’s Stedelijk Museum, has been selected as the 2015 recipient of Independent Curators International’s Agnes Gund Curatorial Award, which “is presented every other year to an established curator for their outstanding contribution to the world of art.”

Read the full article here.

ICI