Curator Florence Derieux Heads to Centre Pompidou Foundation in New York

Is France seeing a curatorial 'brain drain'?

Florence Derieux. Courtesy Julie Berthelemy.

The Centre Pompidou Foundation has tapped curator Florence Derieux as its new Curator of American Art, in New York, and curator at large for the Centre Pompidou, in Paris. Derieux will take up the new position at the beginning of 2016, leaving her role as director of FRAC Champagne-Ardenne in Reims, which she has held since 2008.

Earlier this year, Derieux also ended her stint as curator of the Art Basel Parcours section, where she is succeeded by Samuel Leuenberger.

The announcement comes shortly after the tapping of another French curator, the Musee d’Orsay’s Sylvie Patry, as chief curator at the Barnes foundation. However, as the French paper Le Journal des Arts argues, Derieux’s appointment is not a French case of art world brain drain, as Derieux will maintain close ties with the Parisian art world in her new position.

According to their website, the Centre Pompidou Foundation, chaired by Steven Guttman, is an American-based non-profit “dedicated to supporting the Centre Pompidou in Paris” through acquisitions of works of American art and design, as well as mediating gifts and loans to the Centre Pompidou’s permanent collection.

Arnaud Robinet, deputy mayor of the city of Reims, congratulated Derieux in the local media. Her career path included positions at the Palais de Tokyo (2000-2002), the Picasso Museum in Antibes, and curatorial posts in Lausanne and Grenoble. Derieux joined the FRAC Champagne-Ardenne some seven years ago. “Under the directorship of Florence Derieux, the FRAC has greatly expanded its presence in the entire region while contributing to the influence of Reims and the Champagne-Ardenne nationally and internationally,” said Robinet.


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