June 12 - September 19, 2027
Naomi Beckwith appointed Artistic Director of documenta 16
The Artistic Director of the upcoming documenta 16 has been chosen: "Naomi Beckwith has been selected by the international selection committee and appointed by the Supervisory Board." This was announced by the Managing Director of documenta und Museum Fridericianum gGmbH, Andreas Hoffmann, at a press conference in Kassel today, Wednesday. documenta 16 will take place in Kassel from June 12 to September 19, 2027.
Naomi Beckwith is Deputy Director and Jennifer & David Stockman Chief Curator at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation in New York. There she oversees collections, exhibitions, publications, curatorial programs and archives and is responsible for the strategic direction within the international network of affiliated museums. Previously, she held curatorial positions at the MCA Chicago and the Studio Museum in Harlem. A graduate of the Courtauld Institute of Art, Beckwith has (co-)organized renowned exhibitions and monographic projects, including the award-winning exhibition Howardena Pindell: What Remains to Be Seen (2018, MCA Chicago, USA) and The Freedom Principle: Experiments in Art and Music, 1965 to Now (2015, MCA Chicago, USA). She was a member of the curatorial team for the realization of the exhibition Grief and Grievance: Art and Mourning in America (2021, The New Museum, New York), conceived by Okwui Enwezor before his death. Her exhibitions, lectures and publications focus on the impact and resonance of Black culture on multidisciplinary practices in global contemporary art. As a scholar and art historian, Beckwith has been a visiting professor at Northwestern University and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (both Chicago, USA). She has received fellowships for the Independent Study Program of the Whitney Museum of American Art (New York) and the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia (USA). Beckwith was awarded the 2024 David C. Driskell Prize for African American Art and Art History by the High Museum of Art in Atlanta (USA). She is also currently leading the curatorial team at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris for the fall 2025 exhibitions known as the "American Season".
On the occasion of her appointment, Naomi Beckwith says: "It is an extraordinary honor to be chosen as Artistic Director of documenta 16. documenta is an institution that belongs to the whole world and to Kassel as well. It is also an institution that is in constant dialog with history and at the same time a barometer of art and culture in the immediate present. I am humbled by the scope of this responsibility and equally excited to share my research and ideas with this historic and generous institution: It offers artists, curators and audiences alike space and time for concentration, deep study, exploration, experimentation and new insights."
On behalf of the six-member selection committee, Yilmaz Dziewior, Director of the Museum Ludwig in Cologne, and Mami Kataoka, Director of the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, explained the choice today as follows: "It was not easy to make a decision. Our discussions reflected the complexity and interconnectedness of the current documenta situation. We are convinced of Naomi Beckwith's expertise and international curatorial experience. Her proposal for documenta 16 is dedicated to artistic practices that provide us with tools to think together about possible futures."
"In recent months, we have worked purposefully on the realignment of the documenta organization and laid many good foundations. The fact that we are now able to present Naomi Beckwith as the new Artistic Director for the upcoming documenta 16 exhibition in Kassel in 2027 marks the start of a new documenta future," explained Lord Mayor Sven Schoeller, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of documenta und Museum Fridericianum gGmbH. "I warmly welcome Naomi Beckwith to the documenta city of Kassel and look forward to her artistic concept with excitement and anticipation, as I am sure the entire art and culture world does. I would like to thank the high-caliber group of candidates and all those involved in the selection process. They have done documenta a great service in a difficult situation."
Timon Gremmels, Hessian Minister of State for Science and Research, Art and Culture, emphasized: "Today marks the successful conclusion of the reorganization of documenta. We have been able to attract a high-caliber selection committee, which has chosen an excellent artistic director. Openness, a sense of community and the unifying power of art already characterized the work of the selection committee and also form the basis of Naomi Beckwith's practice. With the implemented reform of documenta, the city and state have laid a good foundation for the future of the world art show. We have found a good way in which freedom of art and discourse can go hand in hand with protection against anti-Semitism and discrimination. I am looking forward to documenta 16 in summer 2027 and to many art-loving visitors in my home town of Kassel."
Andreas Hoffmann thanks all members of the international selection committee for their great commitment: "With their dedication, the selection committee has demonstrated a great sense of responsibility for contemporary art and documenta at this very special time. The intensive exchange between the members has led to a forward-looking choice for the Artistic Director. This has laid the foundation for us to move forward decisively and with anticipation towards documenta 16 and for Kassel to once again host the art world and its international audience in 2027."
Download press material here.
You can watch the press conference in full length here.
The Finding Committee of documenta 16
Six outstanding international experts in contemporary art have been appointed to the Finding Committee of documenta 16, who were unanimously appointed by the Supervisory Board on the recommendation of the Management Board. The commission is made up of Yilmaz Dziewior, Sergio Edelsztein, N'Goné Fall, Gridthiya Gaweewong, Mami Kataoka, and Yasmil Raymond.
The task of the selection committee is to invite pioneering personalities of contemporary art to apply with a concept for the artistic direction of documenta 16 in Kassel and to select the most promising format for implementation from the submissions presented.
The members of the selection committee:
Yilmaz Dziewior (*1964 Bonn, Germany) is Director of the Museum Ludwig in Cologne.
Dziewior previously headed the Kunsthaus Bregenz (KUB) since 2009. In 2015, Dziewior curated the Austrian pavilion for the Venice Biennale and in 2022 the German pavilion, which was curated by Maria Eichhorn. Before working in Bregenz, he was director of the Kunstverein in Hamburg for eight years and also taught as a professor of art theory at the University of Fine Arts there. From 1996 to 1999, he worked as a freelancer for the Museum Ludwig. In 1997 he curated a project there with Sarah Lucas and in 1999 was responsible for the contemporary section of the exhibition Kunstwelten im Dialog. From Gauguin to the Global Present. Dziewior's texts have appeared regularly in "Artforum" (New York), "Camera Austria" (Graz) and "Texte zur Kunst" (Berlin). He has published over 50 books and catalogs on 20th and 21st century art and has written catalog essays for institutions such as the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, the Hamburger Kunsthalle, the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.
Sergio Edelsztein (*1956, Buenos Aires, Argentina) is a freelance curator. He lives in Berlin and Tel Aviv.
In 1995, Edelsztein founded the Center for Contemporary Art in Tel Aviv and was its director and chief curator until 2018. As part of the CCA, he curated seven performance art biennials (under the title Blurrr) and five international video art biennials(VideoZone). Edelsztein curated the Israeli component of the 24th São Paulo Biennale in 1998 and the Israeli pavilions at the Venice Biennale in 2005 and 2013. Since 1995, he has curated exhibitions and time-based events in Spain, China, Poland and Singapore, among others. Among the most important exhibitions he has curated for the CCA are solo exhibitions by Guy Ben Ner, Roee Rosen, Yael Bartana, Marina Abramović, Christian Jankowski, Rosa Barba, Ceal Floyer, Gary Hill and many others. Edelsztein gives lectures, presents video programs and publishes texts in Israel, Spain, Brazil, Italy, Austria, Germany, China, the USA, Switzerland and Argentina and writes for international catalogs, websites and publications.
N'Goné Fall (*1967, Dakar, Senegal) graduated with honors from the École Spéciale d'Architecture in Paris, France. She is an independent curator and expert on cultural policy.
From 1994 to 2001, she was editorial director of the Paris-based magazine for contemporary African art Revue Noire. She is the editor of An Anthology of African Art: The Twentieth Century (Revue Noire / DAP 2002), Photographers from Kinshasa (Revue Noire 2001) and Anthology of African and Indian Ocean Photography: a century of African photographers (Revue Noire 1998). She was guest curator of the Bamako 2001 and Dakar 2002 Biennials and has curated exhibitions in Africa, Europe and the USA, including When Things Fall Apart: Critical Voices on the Radars at the Trapholt Museum in Denmark (2016) and In Quest of Freedom, carte blanche to El Anatsui (Ghana) at the Conciergerie in Paris, 2021. She is the author of strategic plans and evaluation reports for foundations and international organizations in the Netherlands, Belgium, France, USA, Senegal, South Africa, Barbados and South Korea; she was a professor at Senghor University in Alexandria, Egypt (2007- 2011); lecturer at the Michaelis School of Arts in Cape Town, South Africa (2017) and at Abdou Moumouni University in Niamey, Niger (2018).
In 2018, N'Goné Fall was appointed by French President Emmanuel Macron as Commissioner General of the Africa2020 Season, a series of more than 1,500 cultural, scientific and educational events organized in 210 cities across France from December 2020 to September 2021.
Gridthiya Gaweewong (*1964, Chiang Rai, Thailand) is Artistic Director of the Jim Thompson Art Center in Bangkok. Together with Rirkrit Tiravanija, she directed the Thailand Biennale 2023/2024 in Chiang Rai.
Gridthiya Gaweewong is considered one of the best-known curators working in Southeast Asia today. After earning her Master of Arts in Administration and Policy from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1996, Gridthiya co-founded the alternative art space Project 304 with Montien Boonma, Kamol Phaosavasdi and Apichatpong Weerasethakul (1996-2003). In addition to her role as artistic director of the Jim Thompson Art Center in Bangkok, she is also guest curator of the MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum in Chiang Mai. She co-founded the Bangkok Experimental Film Festival with Apichatpong Weerasethakul (1997-2007). Her curatorial projects address issues of social change faced by artists from Thailand and beyond since the Cold War, including Imagined Borders, 12th Gwangju Biennale (2018), Missing Links, Bangkok (2015), Between Utopia and Dystopia, Mexico City (2011), Internationale Kurzfilmtage Oberhausen, Oberhausen (2009), Politics of Fun, Berlin (2005) and Underconstruction, Tokyo (2000-2002). Gaweewong is the curator of the ICI traveling exhibition Apichatpong Weerasethakul: The Serenity in Madness in Chiang Mai, Manila, Hong Kong, Chicago, Oklahoma and Taipei (2016-2020).
Mami Kataoka is director of the Mori Art Museum.
Mami Kataoka was Chief Curator of Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery (1997-2002) and joined Mori Art Museum in 2003, where she became Director in 2020. Since April 2023, she has also been Director of the National Center for Art Research.
From 2007 to 2009, Kataoka was International Curator at the Hayward Gallery in London; she was also Co-Director of the 9th Gwangju Biennale (2012), Artistic Director of the 21st Biennale of Sydney (2018) and Artistic Director of the Aichi Triennale 2022. Kataoka was a board member (2014-2022) and President (2020-2022) of CIMAM (International Committee for Museums and Collections of Modern Art).
At Mori Art Museum, she has curated a series of survey exhibitions of Asian mid-career artists, including Tsuyoshi Ozawa (2004), Ai Weiwei (2009), Lee Bul (2012), Makoto Aida (2012), Lee Mingwei (2014), NS Harsha (2017) and Chiharu Shiota (2019), while curating regional exhibitions such as SUNSHOWER: Contemporary Art from Southeast Asia 1980s to Now (2017) and Roppongi Crossing: Contemporary Japanese Art in 2004 and 2013, respectively.
Kataoka regularly publishes on contemporary art from Japan, Asia and beyond, lectures and serves on juries.
Yasmil Raymond works as a freelance curator and currently lives in Frankfurt am Main.
Raymond was Director of Portikus and Rector of the Städelschule from 2020 to 2024. Previously, she was Associate Curator of Painting and Sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art, New York (2015-2019), Curator at the Dia Art Foundation, New York (2009-2015) and Associate Curator of Visual Arts at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (2004-2009). Over the past twenty years, she has worked with many international artists and served on the boards of several foundations. She is currently a trustee of the Teiger Foundation, the Dia Art Foundation, the Stephen Antonakos Foundation and A.R.T. (Art Resources Transfer), all based in New York. Her major exhibitions include Retrospective on Kara Walker and Monografic Survey on the work of Jean-Luc Moulène and Thomas Hirschhorn's Gramsci Monument. Her most recent exhibition Rirkrit Tiravanija: A LOT OF PEOPLE for MoMA PS1, which she co-curated with Ruba Katrib, is also on view at the Luma Foundation in Arles, France. Raymond holds a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and an MA from the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College.