Sarah Rifky named new senior curator of Institute for Up to date Artwork – VCU Information

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By Jessica McCadden
Institute for Modern Art&#13

The Institute for Up to date Art at Virginia Commonwealth College has appointed Sarah Rifky as senior curator and director of plans. Also, she will maintain a faculty appointment in the VCU College of the Arts. She will start off in early drop.

Rifky is a curator, artwork historian and author, at present completing her Ph.D. dissertation on cultural infrastructure in Egypt at the Historical past, Theory and Criticism program and the Aga Khan Plan for Islamic Architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technological know-how. 

“I am delighted to join the Institute for Modern Artwork and to guide the curatorial team,” Rifky mentioned. “I am excited to be finding out with and contributing to the VCU group as section of the VCUarts school. I imagine the ICA is a generative power for the Richmond group through grassroot systems and intercontinental collaborations. In particular as we navigate the difficulties of a pandemic earth, the ICA’s commitment to develop get the job done by training artists is crucial for art communities around the world. My vision for the curatorial plan will be formed in dialogue with the curators at the institute and co-imagined with Richmond, a town that troubles the myths of American greatness.”

Rifky established and co-directed Beirut, a nonprofit artwork space in Cairo, in which she co-led a staff that developed and ran exhibitions, residencies, new commissions, talks, screenings, performances and pedagogical systems from 2012 to 2015.

For additional than 10 a long time, she has held positions as a curator and educator. She was curatorial agent for documenta13, a quinquennial exhibition of contemporary art in Germany, in 2012, and co-curator of the Biennale Jogja XII, an exhibition that showcases up to date art apply and discourse in Indonesia and Southeast Asia, in 2013. Most not too long ago, she co-convened “The September Summit: Toward an Institute of Black Research,” hosted by the Musée du Quai Branly, marking the inaugural plan for Saison Africa2020 in France.

Rifky has lectured commonly and is the author of many articles and book chapters. She also is the co-editor of “Positionen: Zeitgenössische Künstler aus der Arabischen Welt” and the peer-reviewed journal Thresholds 47: Repeat. Rifky taught fashionable art background and superior studio seminars at the American University in Cairo. She was a guest critic at CCS Bard and an MIT Legatum and Jacobs Basis Fellow for Social Entrepreneurship 2020-21. Rifky retains an M.F.A. in Vital Experiments from the Malmö Konsthögskolan in Sweden. 

“Sarah is ideal for the ICA at VCU. She is much more than an exhibition maker,” mentioned Dominic Willsdon, government director of the ICA. “She has extensive been committed to dialogue, to stay programming, to creating and publishing — in truth to investigating contemporary society in lots of diverse techniques. She provides a transnational viewpoint, she thinks deeply about the nature of institutions and, basically, she is an educator. Her motto is ‘every artwork is a university.’ I endorse that. I could not be more thrilled that she is becoming a member of us.”

In addition to Rifky’s using the services of, the ICA also has elevated Amber Esseiva from associate curator to curator.

A VCUarts alumna, Esseiva has been vital to the ICA’s programming because signing up for the institution in 2016. Esseiva curated decide on commissions from the ICA’s inaugural exhibition, “Declaration” in 2018, and curated displays that includes do the job by artists such as Corin Hewitt, Jonathas de Andrade and Julianne Swartz. Esseiva also curated “Great Force,” the ICA’s 2019 exhibition that includes new commissions and current get the job done by an intergenerational team of 24 artists discovering how art can be used to envision new sorts of race and representation freed from the bounds of historic racial constructs. Mostly just lately, Esseiva curated “Kandis Williams: A Field,” which is presently on check out at the ICA until Sept. 12, and released “Public Annotations,” an interactive, general public program that seeks to reorient curatorial and inventive study. 

“Amber is speedy getting 1 of the most arduous and revolutionary curators of her era in the U.S.,” Willson claimed. “Her operate has been central to these initial three years of the ICA. In many means, ‘Great Force’ was the keynote of our system so considerably. Recent jobs like ‘Public Annotations’ demonstrate what a analyze-centered strategy to programming can be. It is a pleasure and a privilege to work with Amber. She has terrific tasks at this time in enhancement. We look ahead to earning them public.”