Cuauhtémoc Medina Tapped As Chief Curator Of 2018 Shanghai Biennale

Mexican curator, art writer and historian Cuauhtémoc Medina, born Cuauhtémoc Medina González, has been appointed chief curator for the 12th Shanghai Biennale, scheduled to open on November 10, 2018, at the Power Station of Art (PSA).

Cuauhtémoc Medina has been involved in multiple curatorial projects, and was head curator of Manifesta 9 in Genk, Belgium, in 2012. In 2009, he curated Teresa Nargolles’s presentation for the Mexican Pavilion at the 53rd Venice Biennale, titled “What Else Could We Speak About?” Between 2002 and 2008, Cuauhtémoc Medina was the first associate curator of the Tate Modern’s Latin American collection. He has been a member of the Institute of Aesthetic Research of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) in Mexico City since 1992, and became chief curator of UNAM’s University Museum of Contemporary Art (MUAC) in March 2013.

At the MUAC, in 2015, he co-curated “It’s Possible Because It’s Possible,” an exhibition of works by New Delhi-based group Raqs Media Collective, with Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art director Ferrán Barenblit. Raqs Media Collective were the curators of the Shanghai Biennale’s 2016 edition.

In addition to his curatorial duties, between 1999 and 2013, Cuauhtémoc Medina was the head of the “Ojo Breve” (“Brief Eye”) art critical section of Reforma, a newspaper published in Mexico City.

The decision to appoint Cuauhtémoc Medina was made by PSA’s academic committee, currently comprising members Homi K. Bhabha, professor of English and American literature at Harvard University; Donna de Salvo, chief curator and deputy director for programs at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Chris Dercon, former director of Tate Modern, London; critics and curators Fei Dawei and Gao Shiming; artists Feng Yuan, Ding Yi and Gong Yan; curator Hou Hanru; and Mark Wigley, dean of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture.

Brady Ng is the reviews editor of ArtAsiaPacific.

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