Two moves either side of the Atlantic. Kristy Edmunds is to become the new director of MASS MoCA in North Adams, Massachusetts. Edmunds comes from UCLA’s Center for the Art of Performance which she headed up for a decade.
As well as American institutional experience she brings with her knowledge of the Australian art scene from time as the artistic director for the Melbourne International Arts Festival and head of the School of Performing Arts and deputy dean at the Victorian College of the Arts at the University of Melbourne.
Meanwhile across the ocean, in the British seaside town of Margate, Turner Contemporary has announced only its second director in its ten years. Clarrie Wallis, a senior curator of British art at Tate, will take over from founding director Victoria Pomery, who left the institution earlier this month. Wallis has been in her current position since 2016 but joined the Tate in 1999. In that time her shows have included Mark Leckey O’ Magic Power of Bleakness (2019), Mike Nelson: The Asset Strippers (2019), Cerith Wyn Evans: Forms in Space..By Light (In Time) (2017), Mona Hatoum (2016), Patrick Caulfield (2013), Richard Long: Heaven & Earth (2009), Mark Wallinger: State Britain (2007) and Tacita Dean: Recent Films and Other Works (2001). She was also lead curator for Steve McQueen’s Year 3 commission in 2019.