Charles Esche (born 1962, in England) is a museum director, curator and writer. His focus is on art and how it reflects, provokes and influences changes in society. He lives between Edinburgh and Eindhoven.
Eindhoven
Eindhoven () is a city and municipality in the Netherlands, located in the southern province of North Brabant of which it is its largest. With a population of 238,326 on 1 January 2022,Netherlands. In 2012, he established together with 6 other European museums the L'Internationale confederation that aims to establish a European modern and contemporary art institution by 2017. He curated Power and Other Things: Indonesia and Art 1835-today at BOZAR, Brussel in 2017 together with Riksa Afiaty.
He is also professor of curating and contemporary art at the
University of the Arts London
University of the Arts London is a collegiate university in London, England, specialising in arts, design, fashion and the performing arts. It is a federation of six arts colleges: Camberwell College of Arts, Central Saint Martins, Chelsea Coll ...
and is co-editorial director of '' Afterall Journal'' and Afterall Books with Mark Lewis. Afterall is a contemporary art publisher which was launched in 1998 and is based at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. London. It publishes a respected journal and the Exhibition Histories and One Work of Art series. Afterall also produces occasional readers such as Art and Social Change edited by Esche with Will Bradley.
He has (co)curated a number of international contemporary art biennales and other events including Lost Museum, Kunsthalle Oslo, 2017 and Musée Égaré, Printemps de Septembre, Toulouse 2016; the 31st São Paulo Bienal in 2014, and the 2015 Jakarta Biennale.
Earlier he made exhibitions including ''It Doesn't have to be Beautiful Unless it's Beautiful'' at National Gallery of Kosovo, Prishtinë, 2012 (with G.Eilat); ''Strange and Close'' for CAPC, Bordeaux, 2011 (a presentation of the Van Abbemuseum Collection); and ''An Idea for Living'', U3 Slovene Triennale, Moderna Galerija, Ljubljana, 2011. In 2009 and 2007 he was co-curator with Khalil Rabah and Reem Fadda of the 2nd and 3rd RIWAQ Biennials, Ramallah, Palestine. In 2005 he was co-curator of the 9th International Istanbul Biennial with Vasif Kortun, Esra Saregidik and November Paynter, and in 2002 the co-curator with Hou Hanru and Song Wan Kyung of the
Gwangju Biennale
The Gwangju Biennale is a contemporary art biennale founded in September 1995 in Gwangju, South Jeolla province, South Korea. The Gwangju Biennale is hosted by the Gwangju Biennale Foundation and the city of Gwangju. The Gwangju Biennale Founda ...
, Republic of Korea.' In 2000, he co-curated ''Intelligence: Tate Triennial at Tate Britain, London with Virginia Button'' and ''Amateur: Variable Research Initiatives'' at Kunstmuseum, Göteborg, Sweden.
Between 2000 and 2004 he was the director of
Rooseum
The Rooseum Center for Contemporary Art was a formally private-owned (though publicly funded) centre for contemporary art located in Malmö, Sweden.
Founded in 1988 by the Swedish art collector and financier Fredrik Roos (1951-1991), Rooseum beg ...
Center for Contemporary Art in Malmo,
Sweden
Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
. Before that he was at Tramway, Glasgow (1993–97), and founded the proto-academy in Edinburgh (1997–2001).
His main work has involved the theory and practice of art museums, but also the qualities of the art centre or biennial. His writings on institutional possibility and policy are useful aids to rethinking the relation between art and social change. A valuable book is the reader ''Art and Social Change'' published by Afterall and Tate Publishing and co-edited by Esche and Will Bradley. A selection of his texts was published in 2005 under the title ''Modest Proposals'' by Baglam Press, Istanbul in Turkish and English, edited by
Serkan Ozkaya
Serkan may refer to:
People
* Serkan Atak (born 1984), German footballer of Turkish descent
* Serkan Aykut (born 1975), Turkish footballer
* Serkan Balcı (born 1983), Turkish footballer
* Serkan Çalik (born 1986), Turkish footballer
* Serkan � ...
.
There are a further selection of texts at Academia.edu and Mendeley.
Awards
In 2012 he received the European Cultural Foundation's Princess Margriet Award and in 2013 the Minimum Prize from the Pistoletto Foundation. In 2014 he was awarded the CCS Bard College Audrey Irmas Award for Curatorial Excellence.curatorial-excellence /ref>