Frances Wu Giarratano Appointed Deputy Director at Independent Curators International

On January 30, the Independent Curators International (ICI) announced Frances Wu Giarratano as its new deputy director. Giarratano will oversee the daily operations and long-term planning for the organization.

Giarratano joined ICI in 2006, serving as the associate director of exhibitions until her departure in 2013. During this tenure, she supervised all of the organization’s touring exhibitions including group show “State of Mind: New California Art Circa 1970” (2012–14), which debuted at Vancouver’s Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, and traveled to SITE Santa Fe, New York’s the Bronx Museum of the Arts, and Chicago’s Smart Museum of Art. She also directed the production of nine publications, including Martha Wilson Sourcebook (2011), comprised of primary research on the feminist performance artist, and Hans Ulrich Obrist’s do it: the compendium (2013) in collaboration with the curator.

Regarding Giarratano’s new role, Renaud Proch, ICI’s executive and artistic director remarked that “Fran understands the DNA of ICI. She has been integral to so many collaborations with curators all over the world, and is perfectly positioned to steer the organization through a period of programmatic expansion.”

Prior to this current appointment, Giarratano was formerly the director of exhibitions at New York’s American Federation of Arts since 2017. She also served as the inaugural deputy director at Hong Kong’s contemporary art center Para Site from 2014 to 2017, where she helped secure the largest government grant for the institution to date and acquired corporate and individual support for the center’s growth.

The ICI is a non-profit organization that has been producing exhibitions, events, publications, and collaborative programs since 1975 with the aim of connecting curators globally to foster cultural exchange, access to art, and public awareness across borders.

Kylie Yeung is an editorial intern of ArtAsiaPacific.

To read more of ArtAsiaPacific’s articles, visit our Digital Library.