Briefing
Jeff Koons to donate a memorial to the city of Paris; Jenni Lomax to leave Camden Arts Centre
Jeff Koons to donate a memorial to the city of Paris; Jenni Lomax to leave Camden Arts Centre
- American artist Jeff Koons is donating a large-scale sculpture to the city of Paris to commemorate the victims of the multiple terrorist attacks that rocked the capital last year. The monumental work, which will rise to a height of 34 feet, depicts a first clutching a bunch of multi-coloured tulips, and is inspired by Statue of Liberty.
- Jenni Lomax OBE is set to step down as director of London’s Camden Arts Centre after 26 years at the helm. Lomax, who recently oversaw the public institution’s 50th anniversary celebrations, said: ‘I feel it’s a good time to leave. […] There’s money in the bank and I am leaving the place in good nick.’
- Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry may be relocating to France in the wake of the US presidential election. Shortly before Donald Trump was announced as president-elect, Gehry spoke to a French reporter, stating: ‘If Trump is elected, Hollande said I could go into exile in France.’ (French)
- Gabi Ngcobo has been announced as the curator of the 10th Berlin Biennale in 2018. A founding member of the Johannesburg-based community-led platforms NGO – Nothing Gets Organised and Center for Historical Reenactments (CHR, 2010–14), much of her previous work has engaged with collaborative practice and educational projects. Ngcobo is a co-curator of the current 32nd Bienal de São Paulo.
- American photographer Greg Constantine has been barred from visiting his own exhibition in Myanmar, after being told that he could not enter the country because he was on a ‘blacklist’. The exhibition, titled ‘Nowhere People’, presents a body of work documenting stateless people, and includes a number of photographs of Myanmar’s Muslim minority, known as the Rohingya, who live in camps in Rakhine State. Writing in the Myanmar Times in January, Pyae Thet Phyo, minister for labour, immigration and population, wrote that more than 4,300 people were on the blacklist, which was established by the previous government.
- Stefan Borchardt has been appointed director of the Kunsthalle Emden, Germany, as the institution celebrates its 30th anniversary and its 150th exhibition. Borchardt, who has been a curator at the Art Foundation Hohenkarpfen in Hauen ob Verena since 2007, will assume the position in January of next year. (German)
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