Independent Curators International (ICI) supports the work of curators to help create stronger art communities through experimentation, collaboration, and international engagement. Curators are arts community leaders and organizers who champion artistic practice; build essential infrastructures and institutions; and generate public engagement with art. Our collaborative programs connect curators across generations, and across social, political and cultural borders. They form an international framework for sharing knowledge and resources — promoting cultural exchange, access to art, and public awareness for the curator’s role.
Rachel Reese
Since 2020, Rachel Jobe Reese is Director and Curator of the Cress Gallery of Art at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (UTC). From 2015-2019, Reese served as Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at Telfair Museums where she stewarded the permanent collection of modern and contemporary art, including the Kirk Varnedoe Collection, as well as organized 20 special exhibitions in the Jepson Center—including the retrospective and accompanying catalogue for Suzanne Jackson: Five Decades (Telfair Books, 2019), and solo exhibitions with Erin Johnson, Ken Ueno, Carrie Mae Weems, Paul Stephen Benjamin, William Wegman, Triple Candie, Nick Cave, and KCHUNG Radio, among others. Reese held prior positions at Atlanta Contemporary in Atlanta where she curated the 2015 exhibition Pratfall Tramps; Fleisher/Ollman Gallery in Philadelphia; and Deitch Projects, Petzel Gallery and Andrew Kreps Gallery in New York. Reese is a 2014 ICI alumni; was a former editor of Burnaway magazine and responsible for the organization’s first print issue, and her writing and artist interviews have appeared in BOMB Daily, Temporary Art Review, TWELV Magazine, and Art Papers; she also published a free newsprint of artists’ writings called Possible Press from 2010–15. Reese has taught Critical Issues contemporary art courses at PAFA in Philadelphia and Georgia State University in Atlanta. She frequently guest curates, juries and lectures for nonprofit arts organizations nationally, and holds an MFA from City College in New York and a BFA from the University of Georgia.
involved in:
Radical Plastic: Artist Conversation
In conjunction with the exhibition Radical Plastic, on view at CUE Art Foundation (July 16-August 20, 2016), curator Rachel Reese speaks with artists Carson Fisk-Vittori and Ria Roberts.
read more »Pratfall Tramps
Pratfall Tramps—featuring Tammy Rae Carland, Jamie Isenstein, Sara Greenberger Rafferty and Mary Reid Kelley—investigates an artwork’s comedic desire.
read more »2014 Spring Curatorial Intensive Symposium
Join ICI and the Spring 2014 Curatorial Intensive on Tuesday, March 25 for a daylong public symposium where the participants will present the exhibition and project proposals that they have developed through the program.
read more »Considering Publics and Contexts
This March, Independent Curators International (ICI) produces the Curatorial Intensive: Considering Publics and Contexts, a ten-day professional development program that offers curators the opportunity to discuss, among colleagues, the concepts, logistics, and challenges of organizing exhibitions.
read more »