My knowledge of collecting for a public institution has increased vastly through working closely with a contemporary art collection.


I am particularly interested in what I describe as the cognitive process of collecting and how individuals within institutions shape what and which objects enter the museum’s collection. My time at mima led to an in-depth introduction to an outstanding collection of post-American War drawings and contemporary crafts, focusing on these areas post-1900.


Other interests lie in the continual shifts in currency of sound art, with specific reference to its relationship with performance and inherently performance art’s relationship to sound. Sound is ubiquitous, unstoppable, immersive, the agency through which spoken language is understood and music is absorbed. Sound works quietly with other senses to scan an environment, to define orientation within a place and to register the feeling that we describe as atmosphere.


Outside my MA programme, I am curating an interdisciplinary project this summer with a group of emerging and established artists. Future research will involve a focus on contemporary African performance. I contribute regularly to Aesthetica magazine’s blog and have written for This is Tomorrow.


Host organisation: mima, Middlesbrough