Speakers at the Future Now Symposium 2016
Adrian Friedli
Chair, Yorkshire & Humber Contemporary Visual Arts Network
Adrian came to Yorkshire in 1981 to study fine art in Leeds, and has subsequently lived, and worked in the cultural sector in Yorkshire for over twenty-five years, as an artist, in academia, as an independent producer, and in regional and national roles for Arts Council England between 1994 and 2011. More recently, as a creative consultant, Adrian was Programme Lead in the team that bid successfully for Hull to be UK City of Culture in 2017. He is currently Chair of Yorkshire and Humber Contemporary Visual Arts Network, and a non-executive Director of Forced Entertainment and The Tetley.
Agnieszka Prendota
Creative Director, Arusha Gallery
Agnieszka Prendota holds a MA in History of Art from Glasgow University specializing in contemporary art with particular interest in the career paths and creative development of Louise Bourgeois, Paul McCarthy and Lucian Freud. After graduation, she went on to work with several non-profit and commercial creative organizations including Association of Art Historians and SWG3 in Glasgow. She organized and co-curated pop up exhibitions in London, Manchester and Glasgow. Two years ago she was appointed the creative director of Arusha Gallery, where she is responsible for developing the gallery’s portfolio of artists, the brand and exhibition plans both locally in the gallery space and internationally.
Alec Charles
Head of Media, University of Chester
Dr Alec Charles is Head of Media at the University of Chester and co-convenor of the Political Studies Association’s Media and Politics Group. He has taught at universities in Japan, Estonia, Cornwall and Luton, and has worked as a print journalist and as a documentary programme-maker for BBC Radio 3. He is the author of Interactivity: New Media, Politics and Society (2012), Interactivity 2 (2014) and Out of Time (2015), the co-editor of The End of Journalism (2011), and the editor of Media in the Enlarged Europe (2009), Media/Democracy (2013) and The End of Journalism 2 (2014). He has published in a variety of journals including British Journalism Review, Journalism Education, British Politics, Science Fiction Studies and Utopian Studies.
Alistair Payne
Head, School of Fine Art, Glasgow School of Art
Dr Alistair Payne is the Head of the School of Fine Art at The Glasgow School of Art. In 2015, his book chapter titled; The Virtual, Alternate Spaces and the Effects upon Artwork was published in the Handbook of Research on Digital Media and Creative Technologies through IGI Global. In 2013, the book chapter titled; The Virtual and Interdisciplinarity was published, also through IGI Global. In 2008 his book Painting as an Interdisciplinary Form was published through VDM Verlag. He has exhibited his work internationally with group and solo shows in the UK, Norway, Greece, the USA and Thailand, including the solo exhibition Indisciplinary Behaviour, Bergen 2014 and The Ends of Art, Athens 2013 with a forthcoming group exhibition in London, UK, October 2015.
Andrea Luka Zimmerman
Artist, Filmmaker
Andrea is a filmmaker, artist and cultural activist. Andrea grew up on a large council estate and left school at 16. After coming to London in 1991, she went to Central St. Martins. She is co-founder of the artists’ collective Fugitive Images. Her new essay-film Estate, a Reverie, tracks the passing of the Haggerston Estate in East London and the utopian promise of social housing it offered, with a spirited celebration of extraordinary everyday humanity. A founding member of Vision Machine, she worked in the USA and Indonesia, exploring the impact of globalisation, power, and denied histories. Her PhD examined the relationship between spectacular (Hollywood) and spectral (covert and special military operations) representations of political violence.
Andrew Fryer
Head, School of Film, Music and Performing Arts, Leeds Beckett University.
Andrew Fryer is the Head of School of Film, Music and Performing Arts at Leeds Beckett University. He is a songwriter and music producer with 20 years of experience in the industry, working for Warner Chappell Music, Polydor Records, BBC TV and radio, film production companies, independent record labels, as well as building and running his own recording studios. He has engineered and produced over 5000 songs, working with artists across all musical genres. He lectures on aspects of Film, Music and Performing Arts, most recently at the Beijing Film Academy and the Palacio de Mineria. Andrew is a Director and Trustee of Phoenix Dance Theatre and a member of UK Music Academic Partnership.
Anne Braybon
Creative Director, National Portrait Gallery
Anne Braybon is a creative director, photo historian and lecturer. She has commissioned photography for many years, initially as an award winning editorial art director working in Amsterdam, Paris and London. Braybon joined the National Portrait Gallery in an consultancy role with a brief to research, commission and produce themed series of photographic portraits for exhibition and the Gallery’s collection. Latterly she developed and directed the creative approach to a major multifaceted project, National Portrait Gallery/BT Road to 2012. Working together with seven photographers over a period of four years she produced over one hundred new photographic portraits as a record of the London Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Carla Rapoport
Founder, The Lumen Prize
Carla launched The Lumen Prize following a career as a financial journalist with the Financial Times, Fortune Magazine and the Economist Intelligence Unit, working in Tokyo, Hong Kong and London. While Managing Director for the EIU, specialising in global analysis of telecoms and IT, she became fascinated with the effect of new technology on the arts. Her passion for visual arts led her to discover the storied history of computer art in the UK and US, which in turn sparked the idea of elevating the appreciation and understanding of digital arts through an annual prize and global tour. Now in its fifth year, The Lumen Prize has staged over 30 shows and awarded over $30,000 in prize money. Carla lives in the Brecon Beacons and Lumen is based in Cardiff.
Christina Kolaiti
Senior Lecturer, Photography, York St John University
Christina’s research develops in the area of fine art photography and specifically explores the subject of photographic portraiture and self-portraiture at a theoretical and also practical level. Coming from a practice-led perspective, Christina’s work explores the role of narrative as a visual, symbolic and metaphorical representation of a person’s identity and self. Christina’s research has developed a number of projects with medical professionals, students and hospital patients. Christina’s current research activity as a member of the All Maps Welcome post-doctoral research group initiative explores applications of photographic re-narration, within the context of healthcare and beyond.
Dani Burrows
Director of Strategy, Delfina Foundation
Dani Burrows is Director of Strategy at Delfina Foundation, London’s largest international residency space. Dani studied History of Art at Bristol University and began her career in sales at Bonhams Auctioneers before joining Tate as part of the Development team working on capital projects, programme fundraising, acquisition committees and patron groups. In 2013 she joined Delfina Foundation as the Director of Strategy, where she created new programming models, partnerships, fundraising initiatives and produced series of artist commissions as well as deputised on the day-to-day running of the space and the team. In 2016 she became part-time at Delfina Foundation to work on independent projects, which included joining May Calil Consultancy.
Daniel F. Herrmann
Eisler Curator, Whitechapel Gallery
Daniel F. Herrmann is the Eisler Curator and Head of Curatorial Studies at the Whitechapel Gallery, London. An art historian from Hamburg, Germany, his previous exhibitions include The London Open (2015); Hannah Höch (2014); Gillian Wearing (2012), and John Stezaker (2011). Since 2011, he has curated, together with Bina von Stauffenberg, the Max Mara Art Prize for Women (Andrea Büttner: The Poverty of Riches, 2011; Laure Provost. Farfromwords 2013, Corin Sworn: Silent Sticks 2015). He is currently working on the 2017 Max Mara Art Prize: Emma Hart and on the first international touring retrospective of the work of British artist Eduardo Paolozzi, opening at the Whitechapel Gallery in 2017.
David Drake
Director, Ffotogallery
David Drake has 35 years experience in the visual arts and media sector, since 2009 as Director of Ffotogallery, the national development agency for photography and lens-based media in Wales, United Kingdom, and founder Director of the biennial Diffusion: Cardiff International Festival of Photography. For Ffotogallery, he has curated and produced exhibitions and publications featuring international artists such as Helen Sear, Peter Fraser, Michel Campeau, Jo Longhurst, Trine Søndergaard and Daniel Meadows. In 2015, he was Project Director for the Wales pavilion at the Venice Biennale 56th International Art Exhibition and Diffusion 2015 – having chosen the festival’s curatorial theme Looking for America.
David Freer
Founder, O Street
David learnt his trade at Glasgow School of Art and Rhode Island School of Design. He has lived both sides of the Atlantic and now works between Glasgow and London. He knows how to cut the jargon and confusion out of a design job by quickly focussing on the core challenges. His style is quirky and original, giving clients unique, effective and memorable solutions. David founded O Street 10 years ago with business partner Neil Wallace. Existing clients include: BrewDog, RBS and Spotify. Although very happy to still be a hands-on graphic designer, David has also recently flirted with tech entrepreneurship, academia and playing in a metal band. David is also an Associate at Glasgow School of Art’s flagship Institute of Design Innovation.
David Hochgatter
Aesthetica Art Prize Student Winner
David won the Student Prize at this year’s Aesthetica Art Prize, with his piece TIME TO X. The audio installation TIME TO X transforms the fourth dimension, time, into a geometrical expanse. A short audio file is sliced into short fragments, mapped on a horizontal array of 96 loudspeakers and played back simultaneously, so every acoustic element of the sound is continuously audible. The listener experiences a “still picture of a period of time”: From distance a noisy picture can be “seen” at once, while approximation focuses the view and small details can be revealed. When moving very close along the installation, one is – proverbially – moving in time. TIME TO X is currently on display at the Aesthetica Art Prize exhibition at York St Mary’s.
www.vimeo.com/davidhochgatterer
Eleanor Clayton
Curator, The Hepworth Wakefield
Eleanor Clayton is Curator at The Hepworth Wakefield. She previously worked as Assistant Curator: Exhibitions and Displays at Tate Liverpool, and Assistant Curator: Public Programmes at Tate Britain. Prior to this she held research posts at the National Trust and the National Portrait Gallery, and has worked on new commissions by artists such as Martin Creed, Alexandra Bircken and Frances Stark. Clayton is also a freelance writer and curator who regularly contributes to Art Monthly, Frieze and The Skinny. Freelance curatorial projects include Geta Bratescu at Tate Liverpool (Summer 2015). With over 1,600 square metres of gallery spaces, The Hepworth Wakefield is the largest purpose-built exhibition space outside London.
Emily Gosling
Online Editor, It’s Nice That
Emily Gosling is a London-based journalist and editor specialising in art and design. She is currently online editor at It’s Nice That, a platform that serves to champion creativity in all its forms by showcasing the most exciting and engaging work online, in print and through our events programme. Founded in 2007, It’s Nice That has grown across many platforms and has a reach of over half a million readers a month. These include the website which is updated daily, a bi-annual magazine Printed Pages, a summer symposium Here and the monthly Nicer Tuesdays talks series. Emily was previously on staff at Design Week, and has written across numerous platforms. She has a pet hedgehog named Chapman, after the brothers.
Fin Murphy
Editor, Don’t Panic
Fin is the London-based editor of Don’t Panic and its spin-off zine, previously he has written for publications such as Vice, i-D, The Big Issue in the North and several others (of varying popularity/quality). In his current role, Fin aims to bring attention to upcoming creative talent, look into credible, lesser examined topics and introduce new ideas to fulfil his publication’s potential. His interests include defending comics as proper reading, worrying about developing a gut and socialising. You can get in touch with him @Finspo on Twitter. Don’t Panic is an online magazine with a sense of humour that covers art, music, style, film, technology, and current events.
Ian Fenton
Producer, Random Acts Network Centre North
Ian Fenton is Creative Director, Learning & Participation at Tyneside Cinema and leads on the design and delivery of a range of opportunities for young filmmakers and artists including the Random Acts education, training and production programme in the North of England for Arts Council England and Channel 4, the national BFI Film Academy Residential Programme in Screenwriting and Northern Stars Documentary Film Academy. In previous incarnations he has been the Maker of Stuff, including feature film White Settlers, the multi-award winning alternate reality game Time Machine, a baker’s dozen of short films, and 25 hours of prime time television drama including a BAFTA nominated episode of children’s television classic Byker Grove.
James Boaden
Lecturer, History of Art, University of York
Dr James Boaden is lecturer in modern and contemporary art in the History of Art department at the University of York. His research and teaching looks at the crossover between traditional media and experimental film and video in the United States from the 1930s to the present day. He has organised film screenings at Tate Modern, BFI, Nottingham Contemporary, and The Hepworth Wakefield. His publications include essays in Oxford Art Journal, Art History, and Little Joe. An essay on Maria Lassnig’s animated films will appear in the catalogue for the artist’s retrospective at Tate Liverpool in summer 2016.
James Smith
Course Leader, BA (Hons) Photography, NUA
James is Course Leader BA (Hons) Photography at Norwich University of the Arts. He comes from a commercial photographic background that includes industrial photography, editorial content for the specialist rock climbing market and work for design agencies. Work undertaken for these companies has involved producing images for literature to promote clients ranging from youth development initiatives to business lawyers. In January 2009 James enrolled on the Doctoral Programme in Educational Research at Lancaster University. He is involved in research looking at the implementation of Policy within the School of University, using situational analysis to assess current thinking and pedagogic practice within this area.
James Winter
Aesthetica Art Prize Shortlisted Artist
James Winter, a London born and based multidisciplinary artist, whose practice examines societal structures and lineages that are intrinsic to man’s development. Winter uses site specific installations to act as a catalyst for a wider sociopolitical discussion to challenge and engage with complex topical issues of our time, so often viewed as taboo subjects within the mainstream. Studied at University of the Arts London, LCC and then went on to gain an MA in Fine Art Printmaking from The Royal College of Art. Finalist at the Aesthetica Art Prize in 2016, winner of the 20/21 British Art Fair Prize and First Prize D&AD Yellow Pencil Award. Spatial Light Constructs is currently on display at the Aesthetica Art Prize exhibition.
Jenny Kean
Head of Programme, Media Production, York St John University
Jenny’s career in journalism spans 25 years in radio and magazines. With the BBC, she covered stories ranging from the fall of the Berlin Wall to the historic 2010 election count. She began her career with the BBC World Service and later worked as producer on the flagship Breakfast programmes at BBC Hereford & Worcester, BBC Shropshire and BBC Radio York. Jenny taught an International Broadcast Journalism MA at Birmingham City University, before moving to Spain for five years where she edited English language lifestyle magazine La Luz. Before joining York St John, Jenny was course leader for the BA Hons Journalism degree at Leeds Beckett. She is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.
Jo Stockham
Professor of Print, Royal College of Art
Jo is an artist who is concerned with the ways in which we create and understand images and objects and their affect in relation to our social encounters with art. She works primarily with installations, often including printed matter and is currently focusing on publications and collaborations which explore urban experience and diagrams. She is particularly interested in print histories and the emergence of the web as a continuation of the (often compromised) democratic potentials for image and information sharing. As Professor of Print in the School of Fine Art at The Royal College of Art, London she encourages the development of Print as an expanded field where conceptual and material potentials are in constant dialogue.
John O’Shea
Senior Exhibition Manager, National Media Museum
John O’Shea is a curator, producer and artist committed to exploring emerging technologies and new artforms. He has curated and produced projects for FACT, Futureverything, Abandon Normal Devices and Liverpool Biennial and worked in partnership with commercial companies such as EA SPORTS. In 2011/12 he was artist in residence at the University of Liverpool Clinical Engineering Research Unit on a Wellcome Trust funded project Pigs Bladder Football where he created the world’s first bio-engineered football, grown from living pig bladder stem cells. He most recently established the Out of Play arts programme and digital collecting policy at the National Football Museum culminating in Pitch to Pixel, a major exhibition of football and gaming.
Julia Michalska
Deputy Web Editor, The Art Newspaper
Julia Michalska is a Polish-Austrian art journalist based in London. She studied art history at Boston University and the University of Oxford. Soon after graduating, she began her career in art publishing, working as Junior Editor for Elena Foster’s C Photo Magazine. She then started working for The Art Newspaper, specialising in German and central European art news. She is currently The Art Newspaper’s Deputy Web Editor, commissioning and editing news, producing its daily newsletter and managing its social media accounts for daytime audiences in Europe. She has also co-edited The Art Newspaper’s daily editions at Frieze London and Art Basel Hong Kong. She will be co-editing the daily editions at the forthcoming Art Basel fair.
Kirstie Hamilton
Head of Exhibitions & Displays, Museums Sheffield
Kirstie Hamilton has almost 20 years of experience working with visual art. As Head of Exhibitions and Displays at Museums Sheffield, she is responsible for a diverse programme of exhibitions created to engage broad audiences with art and culture. Recently, Kirstie was instrumental in the organisation of Going Public: International Art Collectors in Sheffield which involved organisations in the city working with four international art collectors. The project culminated in an international summit, bringing UK museum professionals into conversation with art collectors from across the globe. Museums Sheffield is responsible for three of the city’s museums and galleries: Millennium Gallery, Weston Park Museum and Graves Gallery.
Laura Turner
Senior Curator, York Art Gallery
Laura Turner is Senior Curator at York Art Gallery, leading the exhibitions programme and the development and care of collections. She was lead curator on the recent £8million development of York Art Gallery which reopened in August 2015 with a 60% increase in exhibition space, a new artist’s garden and the new Centre of Ceramic Art. At York Art Gallery, Laura has curated a wide range of historic, modern and contemporary art exhibitions from David Hockney to William Etty. She has an MA in Museum Studies from the University of Leicester, is an Associate of the Museums Association and is on the committee for Pre 1900 European Paintings Research at The National Gallery and the Beecroft Bequest, administered by the Museums Association.
Lee Taylor
Publisher & Editor, Flux
Lee started Flux Magazine alongside Claire Lomax after leaving MMU and it began life as a 30 page mainly black and white fanzine in 1997 in Manchester. Over several years and a lot of trial and error they realised they could push it onto newer and greater levels until eventually it flourished as an internationally distributed creative style magazine. In 2008 Lee and Claire Lomax took the decision to transform the magazine and whole business model and publish Flux completely online. They also set up its sister title Fluxlings around this time. Alongside this Lee has worked for several publications and brands over the years including Dazed & Confused and has published print magazines and newspapers for the Flannels Group, Absolut Vodka and Arts Council.
Liz West
Aesthetica Art Prize Shortlisted Artist
Liz West graduated from Glasgow School of Art in 2007, with a BA (Hons) degree in Fine Art: Sculpture and Environmental Art. Since then she has exhibited her work both nationally and internationally. West has been recently been shortlisted for several awards including Aesthetica Art Prize, Light Art Project of the Year at the Lighting Design Awards and Best Light Art Installation at the Darc Awards. She recently won a Bursary Award from the Royal British Society of Sculptors and an Arts Council England Grants for the Arts Individual Award. Recent commissions include: Colour and Vision at the Natural History Museum, Solstice Ritual at Penarth Pavilion, Our Colour Reflection at 20-21 Visual Arts Centre and Zenith Blue + Primary Red at Arcadecardiff.
Maggie Ellis
Head of Artists’ Moving Image, FLAMIN
Maggie Ellis has been in the film and TV industries for 24 years, working with broadcasters, distributors and associated companies. She has set up commissioning schemes, for shorts and feature films, including the Microwave production scheme for debut feature film-makers. These initiatives have helped launch the careers of some highly regarded UK film-making talent. Maggie is currently Head of Film London’s Artists’ Moving Image Network, a department which commissions artists’ films and runs the prestigious annual Jarman Award. She is also a freelance producer and film advisor to a number of cultural organisations. Maggie is on the advisory panel for the Wellcome Trust, the Boards of SMEC and the Brief Encounters Film Festival.
Michael White
Professor, History of Art, University of York
Michael White is a Professor of History of Art at the University of York, where he specialises in the history of the European Avant-Gardes. His major publications include De Stijl and Dutch Modernism (MUP 2003) and Generation Dada: The Berlin Avant-Garde and the First World War (Yale 2013). He was consultant curator of the Tate Modern exhibition Theo van Doesburg and the International Avant-Garde in 2010 and co-curator of Mondrian and his Studios at Tate Liverpool in 2014.
Olivier Richon
Photography Lecturer, Royal College of Art
Olivier has been Head of the Photography programme at the Royal College of Art since 1997, and became a Professor there in 2006. His photographic work investigates the artifice of representation through the genre of the still life and animal portraiture. Research questions include the relation between the eye and other sense impressions; photography and literature; temporality and narrative forms in the still and the moving image. His work is in the collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum, Musée d’art moderne de la ville de Paris; Museum Folkwang, Essen; National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto; Brooklyn Museum; Tate Britain. He is currently completing a book on one photograph by Walker Evans, Kitchen Corner, Alabama 1936.
Rachel Ara
Aesthetica Art Prize Winner 2016
Rachel won the Main Prize at this year’s Aesthetica Art Prize, with her piece This Much I’m Worth. Rachel’s work starts with an initial concept that evolves through long periods of research and developmental processes; construction, deconstruction, intuition, experimentation even sporadic mishaps that require a hands-on approach. Rachel draws on solid skills having worked as Computer Systems Designer for 25 years. She’s also a trained cabinetmaker and has worked with electronics and photography. Her choice of media is the one that is most able to articulate her ideas, previously incorporating 16mm film, neon, sound, programming and CAD. This Much I’m Worth is on display at the Aesthetica Art Prize Exhibition.
Remco de Blaaij
Curator, CCA Glasgow
Remco de Blaaij is curator at CCA Glasgow since October 2012. Previously he co-curated Picasso in Palestine whilst working at the Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, The Netherlands since 2007. He worked in the team of Be(com)ing Dutch, a two-year elaborate project in the museum that dealt with residues of globalisation, national identity and immigration. In 2011 he concluded his research at the Centre for Research Architecture, Goldsmiths University with the publication too little, too late on border practices of visual culture against the background of Suriname, South America. In 2013 he was recipient of the CPPC/ICI Travel Grant for Central America and the Caribbean. CCA curates six major exhibitions a year, presenting international contemporary artists.
Reyahn King
Chief Executive, York Museums Trust
Chief Executive of York Museums Trust, Reyahn King previously worked as the Director of Art Galleries at National Museums Liverpool, Head of Exhibitions and Interpretation at Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery and Head of Heritage Lottery Fund West Midlands from 2012. York Museums Trust looks after several iconic historical and heritage sites in the city of York: York Castle Museum, the Yorkshire Museum and Gardens, York St Mary’s and York Art Gallery. Reyahn has also worked for numerous other cultural institutions including Coventry Arts and Heritage, the National Portrait Gallery and the National Gallery. She chaired the Jury for the John Moores Painting Prize in 2008 and 2010, and was a judge for Liverpool Art Prize 2008.
Richard Page
Programme Leader, BA (Hons) Photography, MMU
Richard Page is a photographic artist based in Manchester and is currently Programme Leader of BA (Hons) Photography at Manchester Metropolitan University. He received the Jerwood Photography Award in 2004 and his artist’s monograph What We Already Know was published by Ffotogallery in 2007. Employing a variety of approaches, his work considers how space is implicitly bound up with history, memory, and our psychological relationship with place. Richard’s work featured in Diffusion: The Cardiff International Festival of Photography for which he curated the exhibition and publication From Common Differences. Richard is currently working on a project in Spain, The Dialogue Of The Dogs, which will be exhibited at the Francesca Maffeo Gallery.
Rosalind Furness
Managing Editor, Frieze
Rosalind Furness is Managing Editor of frieze and former Reviews Editor at both ArtReview and Modern Painters magazines. Previous roles also include Print Manager at the Serpentine Gallery, London, and Catalogue Editor at frieze. She studied Art History and Italian at University College London (UCL), and now lives in West Sussex, UK. frieze is a media and events company that comprises four publications, frieze magazine, frieze d/e, Frieze Masters Magazine and Frieze Week. frieze magazine was set up in 1991 and includes essays, reviews and columns by today’s most forward-thinking writers, artists and curators. Established by Amanda Sharp, Matthew Slotover and Tom Gidley, frieze has since grown to incorporate Frieze London, Frieze New York and Frieze Masters.
Rosie Cooper
Head of Programmes, Liverpool Biennial
Rosie Cooper is Head of Programmes at Liverpool Biennial. She co-curated the exhibition on James McNeil Whistler with Mai AbuElDahab for Liverpool Biennial 2014. Prior to that, she curated the public programme at Barbican Art Gallery, and initiated a contemporary art gallery in a suburban London school. With William Cobbing, she has co-curated a series of events, displays and publications titled Bob Jubilé that examines the legacy of concrete and sound poet Bob Cobbing, culminating in Boooook (Occasional Papers, 2015). Other exhibitions and events include More Soup and Tart, Barbican Theatre, London (2011), Tableau Vivant: A Wandering Retrospective, Prospect New Orleans (2010) and Savoy Café, London, 2009.
Roxy McKenna
Creative Industries Manager, Northern Film & Media
As Creative Industries Manager for film and television development agency Northern Film & Media Roxy is responsible for designing and delivering a range of talent development programmes for filmmakers both regionally and nationally alongside developing collaborative projects with industry partners. Recent projects include commissioning and exec producing a slate of Random Acts films for Channel 4 and managing The Artist’s Cut a talent programme and short film commission aimed at supporting artists interested in developing narrative film delivered in partnership with BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art. Prior to Northern Film & Media Roxy worked within arts development and in film exhibition and production.
Sarah Brown
Programme Curator, Leeds Art Gallery
Sarah Brown is currently Programme Curator at Leeds Art Gallery. She is responsible for the overall programme at Leeds Art Gallery, including exhibitions, collections and the public programme. In 2015 she was responsible for the opening and launch of British Art Show 8 at Leeds Art Gallery including major commissions with Yorkshire Sculpture Triangle, Martino Gamper, Turner Prize nominee Ciara Philips and Linder Sterling with Northern Ballet. She has curated solo shows with Bruce McLean, Becky Beasley, Fiona Rae and Gary Hume and produced major commission by Nike Savvas, Shezad Dawood and Sonia Boyce. She has overseen major exhibitions including Henry Moore, Art and Life: Exploring the Work of Winifred and Ben Nicolson.
Sebastian Bland
Creative Director, Suitcase Magazine
Sebastian Bland is the Creative Director of travel media company SUITCASE. He joined the magazine barely weeks after handing his final portfolio at Bristol University of West England but immediately made an impact. Within three years he progressed from never having designed a magazine before, to creating an entire brand identity, producing each print issue and conceptualising a website and dozens of apps. Sebastian also works closely with some of the world’s biggest brands and tourism boards to create innovative content and multi-media, multi-platform, experiential campaigns. Through a quarterly print magazine, a constantly updated website, apps, pop-up shops and events, SUITCASE aims to immerse you in the fabric of a destination.
Shonagh Manson
Director, Jerwood Visual Arts
Shonagh Manson is Director of Jerwood Charitable Foundation, a leading private grant-making foundation supporting artist development in the UK, and of Jerwood Visual Arts, a national programme which commissions and presents work by early career visual artists, writers and curators. At Jerwood she has founded and co-founded initiatives including the national Weston Jerwood Creative Bursaries programme, the Jerwood/FVU Awards, Jerwood Makers Open and Jerwood Open Forest. Previously, Shonagh worked at the Wellcome Trust, Fuel and Battersea Arts Centre. She was a founding Trustee of Situations in Bristol, and sits on a number of selection and judging panels for talent development programmes.
Sophie Hall
Gallery Director, Flowers Gallery
Sophie Hall is a Gallery Director at Flowers Gallery, London. Established in 1970, Flowers Gallery represents established and emerging artists working in all media. Sophie’s role at the gallery includes client and artist liaison, exhibition curation and programming. Her specialism is print publishing, and she has extensive knowledge of contemporary print artists and studios. Sophie has consulted on a number of projects which include the cataloguing of the Tim Sayer Bequest, an extensive collection of works gifted to the Hepworth Wakefield, and she will sit on the panel of judges for The Rose Award for Photography at this year’s Royal Academy summer exhibition. Sophie has curated key exhibitions by Richard Smith, Derek Boshier, and Boyd & Evans.
Stephanie Bush
Programme Manager, The Zabludowicz Collection
The Zabludowicz Collection is dedicated to supporting emerging artists and arts organisations through a programme of exhibitions, events and residencies across permanent venues in the UK, USA and Finland and a dynamic and growing collection of art works. Stephanie, as Programme Manager, oversees the touring programme, press, marketing and the planning and implementation of all exhibitions, projects and commissions. Current touring exhibitions include Lizzie Fitch/Ryan Trecartin: Priority Innfield and Jon Rafman. Prior to joining the Collection, Stephanie organised exhibitions and international tours at Tate Modern and worked on exhibitions programming, artist liaison and setting up the registration department at Victoria Miro Gallery.
Steven Gartside
Curator, Holden Gallery
Dr Steven Gartside is the Curator at the Holden Gallery, Research Fellow at Manchester School of Art and runs the MA/MFA Contemporary Curating programme. Recent Holden Gallery exhibitions include: Model Behaviour, Trial/Error/Art, Up/Down and Urban Psychosis, working with artists such as David Batchelor, Olaf Breuning, Sophie Calle, Moyra Davey, Thomas Demand, Noemie Goudal, Rosalind Nashashibi, Romand Signer, Fiona Tan and Gillian Wearing. Other curatorial projects have taken place at Henry Moore Institute, Manchester Museum and Whitworth Art Gallery amongst other places. Steven is currently in the midst of a writing project that explores contained spaces from model villages to zoos.
Susanna Davies-Crook
Contributing Visual Arts Editor, Dazed & Confused
Susanna Davies-Crook is an artist and writer based in London and previously Berlin. Recent exhibitions and performances include Janus Arch at Green Ray, Star Chamber at Res., APOPHENIA at Islington Mill with #temporarycustodians, Edge of Human at Los Angeles 2019, Horizon Shine/DKUK at Ancient and Modern London, Auto Couture and DigitalDriftsxKilometre included in L’Échappée Belle at the Grand Palais, Paris. As a contributing art editor at Dazed & Confused and contributing editor at Berlin-based Sleek, she has contributed writing on contemporary art for the past five years to magazines including Harpers Bazaar Art Arabia, Frieze online, LEAP and Thisistomorrrow and previously held the post of art editor at ExBerliner Magazine.
Tim Corum
Director of Curatorial & Public Engagement, The Horniman
Tim Corum has worked in a number of major city museums and art galleries, developing creative content at Oldham, Leeds, Bristol and most recently the Horniman in London. In Bristol he offered artists space and licence to intervene in and reframe the museum and art gallery. He also led the creative team that developed the new museum M Shed, built on the principles of co-curation. In 2015 Tim became a director at the Horniman, where his commitment to working in participation with the public and engaging artists continues. His work at the Horniman is focused on developing participatory programmes which bring practitioners from a wide variety of artistic and creative backgrounds together with communities to make public events that resonate with the museum’s international collections.
Vanessa Corby
Senior Lecturer, Theory, History & Practice of Fine Art, York St John University
Vanessa Corby studied painting as an undergraduate in the 1990s and went on to gain an MA and PhD at the University of Leeds in the early 2000s. Her research is the product of a fascination with the processes, materiality and performativity of art practice with particular reference to the aesthetic transformation of cultural, historical and social experience. Her work on the German Jewish American Artist Eva Hesse has been published by Prestel Press (2006) and I B Tauris (2010). At present she is writing a new book that considers the impact of psychoanalysis on the perception of art and its social value. She is Senior Lecturer in the Theory, History and Practice of Fine Art at York St John University and lives in Leeds.
Warren Fearn
Head of Programme, Design, York St John University
Warren began his career gaining a MA Furniture Design at Bucks University before becoming a freelance designer. The BBC offered him a position as a Virtual Set Designer to develop innovative 3D virtual environments for television. Over the years, he has claimed many prestigious awards and also been nominated for an Emmy Award at the New York Festival. Warren eventually set up his own company WAK Studios as Creative Director for several years working on commercial and educational projects for WWF, Sky, DHL, Fellowes, NHS and many more. He became an Autodesk Accredited Trainer and has produced online curriculum for the Autodesk STEAM website for schools in both the USA and UK. His other interest lies within augmented reality, 3D printing and stereoscopic content.