The Venice Biennale has appointed chief curator at the Centre Pompidou, Christine Macel, as Director of the Visual Arts Sector, responsible for curating the 57th International Art Exhibition for 2017. The decision was reached at a meeting of the board on Friday January 22.

Following the mixed reviews of Okwui Enwezo’s highly politicized 56th edition, the biennale stated that they have hired Macel for her focus on the vital role artists play in society.

“In the wake of the Biennale Arte directed by Okwui Enwezor, centered on the theme of the rifts and divisions that pervade the world, and aware that we are currently living in an age of anxiety, La Biennale has selected Christine Macel as a curator committed to emphasizing the important role artists play in inventing their own universes and injecting generous vitality into the world we live in,” Paolo Baratta, president of the Venice Biennale said in a statement on their website.

Bratta’s statement cited Macel’s tenure at the Centre Pompidou as key in the Biennale’s decision. “Her experience in the Department of “Création contemporaine et prospective” at the Centre Pompidou in Paris has long offered her a vantage point rich in potential from which to observe and identify new energies coming from various parts of the world,” the statement elaborated.

Okwui Enwezor, Director of the Visual Arts section – la Biennale di Venezia
Curator of the 56th International Art Exhibition “All The World’s Futures”
Photo: Giorgio Zucchiatti

Macel has been chief curator at the Centre Pompidou since 2000. During her time at the institution, she founded and ran the museum’s department of contemporary art.

She has organized many exhibitions during this time, including 2011’s “Danser sa vie, art et danse aux XX et XXIème siècles” as well as shows by artists Gabriel Orozco, Philippe Parreno, Nan Goldin, and Sophie Calle. She also curated Anri Sala at the French Pavilion in 2013, and Eric Duyckaerts for the Belgian Pavilion in 2007, at the Venice Biennale.

The 57th Venice Biennale will take place from May 13 to November 26, 2017