Exhibition
2021 Triennial: Soft Water Hard Stone
10/28/21-01/23/22
Conversations · Exhibition-Related
2021 Triennial Curator Roundtable
Cover Image:
photograph of Jamillah James by Paul Mpagi Sepuya, photograph of Margot Norton by Scott Rudd, and photograph of Eva Respini by Liza Voll Photography
Celebrate the opening of the 2021 Triennial “Soft Water Hard Stone” with a conversation featuring co-curators Margot Norton, Allen and Lola Goldring Curator of the New Museum, and Jamillah James, Senior Curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, in dialogue with Eva Respini, Barbara Lee Chief Curator of the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston.
This program will explore the intricacies of curating an international exhibition during times of significant change. The curators will also share the stories, insights, and concepts that undergird the 2021 Triennial.
About the Speakers
Jamillah James is Senior Curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (ICA LA). James has held curatorial positions at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, working in collaboration with Art + Practice; the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York; and Queens Museum, New York. She has curated major surveys of Nayland Blake and B. Wurtz; several thematic group exhibitions, including “The Inconstant World” (2021), “A Shape That Stands Up” (2016), and “sisters and brothers” (2014); and solo exhibitions of Lucas Blalock, Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Alex Da Corte, rafa esparza, Ann Greene Kelly, Maryam Jafri, Stanya Kahn, Simone Leigh, and Harold Mendez, among others. James is a recipient of a Curatorial Research Fellowship from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts (2021) and a VIA Art Foundation Curatorial Fellowship (2018). She has contributed to Artforum, Frieze, Art in America, The International Review of African American Art, and numerous exhibition catalogues, and regularly lectures on contemporary art, curating, and professional development for emerging artists.
Margot Norton is the Allen and Lola Goldring Curator at the New Museum and is co-curator of the 2021 New Museum Triennial with Jamillah James. Norton joined the Museum in 2011 and has worked on a number of exhibitions, curating and cocurating presentations by Carmen Argote, Judith Bernstein, Diedrick Brackens, Sarah Lucas, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Chris Ofili, Pipilotti Rist, Mika Rottenberg, and Kaari Upson, among others. In 2017, she curated the Eighth Sequences Real Time Art Festival in Reykjavik, Iceland, and the Georgian Pavillion at the 2019 Venice Biennale with artist Anna K.E.. Before she joined the New Museum in 2011, Norton worked as a curatorial assistant at the Whitney Museum, New York. She has contributed to and edited numerous publications and exhibition catalogues, and regularly lectures on contemporary art and curating. She holds a MA in Curatorial Studies from Columbia University, New York.
Eva Respini is the Barbara Lee Chief Curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), Boston, where she has been leading the vision of the program since 2015. Respini is organizing, with MoMA PS1, the first museum survey dedicated to the work of Deana Lawson, on view at the ICA in early November 2021. She is the co-commissioner of the United States Pavilion’s historic Simone Leigh presentation for the 59th Venice Biennale in 2022.
Accessibility
This program will be live captioned.
We strive to make our programs as accessible as possible. For full accessibility information, including services available by request, please click here.
Sponsors
New Museum Digital Initiatives are generously supported by Hermine and David B. Heller.
This program is made possible, in part, by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, and from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.
We gratefully acknowledge the Bowery Council of the New Museum for its support of Education and Public Engagement Programs.
Endowment support is provided by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund; the Skadden, Arps Education Programs Fund; and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs at the New Museum.
Support for the 2021 Triennial, “Soft Water Hard Stone,” can be viewed here.
