Museum people
We owe exciting and inspiring exhibitions not least to their curators. Three portraits.
Museum curators “take care” of art in the literal sense of the term. Three of the most famous curators from Germany are Susanne Gaensheimer (above), Okwui Enwezor (below) and Klaus Biesenbach. Gaensheimer, director of Frankfurt’s Museum für Modern Kunst, made a name for herself worldwide as curator of the German Pavilion at the 2011 Venice Biennale by winning the Golden Lion that year. She is also behind the German contribution for 2013: “I believe that a country like Germany can no longer be seen outside a global context, especially the art scene.” So she has chosen three international and one Franco-German artist for the show.
Enwezor has been director of the Haus der Kunst in Munich for two years. Born in Nigeria and educated in the United States, this cosmopolitan curator is credited, among other things, with internationalizing the documenta in Kassel when he was director in 1998–2002. Biesenbach, curator at New York City’s famous MoMA and also director of MoMA PS1, is the big star among these curators thanks to spectacular exhibitions such as the retrospective show with the German cult band Kraftwerk.
