Black Curators Forum

Curators from across Canada will gather for the inaugural meeting of the Black Curators Forum, a knowledge-sharing initiative that aims at fostering dialogue and social change, addressing unique challenges and highlighting the marginalized, suppressed and often forgotten contributions of Black art professionals to museums and galleries.

“We hope that this gathering of emerging, mid-career and established Black curators will generate creative avenues for responding to the particular issues that define our practice today. Through this unprecedented forum, we are carving a space for Black curators to have critical conversations about leadership development, various obstacles and opportunities, as well as the changing landscape of contemporary art in Canada and internationally,” stated the organizing committee chairing the inaugural meeting. The committee consists of: Dominique Fontaine, Curator and Founding Director of Aposteriori; Gaëtane Verna, Director, The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery; Julie Crooks, Associate Curator, Art Gallery of Ontario; and Pamela Edmonds, Senior Curator, McMaster Museum of Art.

The forum is inspired by a belief in the role of Black curators as cultural producers, change-makers and social innovators. Within a hostile climate of growing expressions of anti-Black racism, and all forms of antagonism against Black communities in North America, it is imperative to provide a more nuanced understanding of over four hundred years of Black presence in this part of the world—and especially how this presence has been elucidated and contextualized through art and culture.

“Although this gathering is directed at Black curators, it is about including everyone in the conversation,” the organizing committee added. “All participants are known to be leaders within their communities, with inclusive and reconciliatory agendas. But we hope to go beyond the question of representation. For us, this forum is about probing the specificity of our identities and struggles as Black art professionals and examining what it is about our individual and collective experiences that can inform not only our own approaches, but can also make a strong and lasting contribution to the contemporary art world at large.”

The program includes a talk by invited guest speaker, Courtney J. Martin, Director, Yale Center for British Art. The three-day gathering will create opportunities for participants to exchange ideas through roundtable discussions, facilitated talks, visits to local galleries and a tour of Art Toronto 2019. The sessions are organized around themes including: access and inclusion, and how to champion equity and diversity; career progression, navigating institutions and impacting the field; future plans for the Black Curators Forum, and methods of consolidating alliances and encouraging collaborations. The forum will allow for a deepened understanding of the participants’ practices, forging a closer network of peers.

The inaugural meeting will ask a series of interrelated questions: how can Black curators negotiate the often foreign terrain of the art world, and combat the marginalization that minority populations confront in conventionally non-Black art institutions? What is the responsibility of Black curators within a context where their communities continue to grapple with realities of exclusion, discrimination and systematic violence? How can this group center curatorial practice around the lived experiences, unique perspectives and diverse identities of Black art professionals? How should we evaluate and learn from both the toils and triumphs of Black curators? And, given the transformations taking place within the art world today, what will institutions look like over the next few years, and what is the role of Black curators in their future?

Participants in the inaugural meeting include: Alexa Joy, Andrea Fatona, Ashley Mackenzie-Barnes, Betty Julian, Cheryl Blackman, Chiedza Pasipanodya, Crystal Mowry, Danilo Deluxo, David Woods, Emilie Croning, Eunice Bélidor, Felicia Mings, Geneviève Wallen, James Oscar, Joana Joachim, Josephine Denis, Liz Ikiriko, Mark Campbell, Ronald Rose-Antoinette, Sally Frater, Shelley Falconer and Yaniya Lee. 

The Black Curators Forum is made possible thanks to a generous grant by the Canada Council for the Arts, and contributions by The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery and Art Gallery of Ontario. The inaugural meeting is coordinated by Amin Alsaden, RBC Curatorial Fellow, and Laura Demers, TD Curator of Education & Outreach Fellow, The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery.