ICI is delighted to announce that we now have a permanent presence in Chicago, and welcome Scott Vincent Campbell as our new Midwest Programs Manager. Scott will manage professional development and public programs in Chicago and the Midwest region, and represent a powerful new point of engagement between ICI and the U.S.’s cultural landscape. While he plays a critical role in our existing programs—Including the current Curatorial Assembly across the Mississippi River basin region and our planning for 2023’s Curatorial Forum with EXPO Chicago—Scott’s primary goal is to connect with our many existing collaborators and develop new relationships, artistic and curatorial projects, and pathways for the future of ICI. Placing an emphasis on first listening to the needs of the community we serve, ICI is looking forward to getting to know the region's arts ecosystem in a deeper and more supportive way. Please reach out at scott@curatorsintl.org to connect!
ICI is at its best when we are working in partnership, so we are actively seeking opportunities to meet with our collaborators in the region, build a robust and convivial permanent network, and support new and innovative curatorial projects. As a working artist and curator himself, Scott is also very interested in broadening the connections between curators and artists to meet our boundary-breaking, multidisciplinary cultural moment. While he is based in Chicago, and having recently completed his MFA at the University of Chicago, Scott has strong roots in Detroit and has worked across the Midwest region throughout his career.
Executive & Artistic Director Renaud Proch says:
“ICI has forged many important partnerships with individuals and institutions in Chicago over the last decade, and the city has grown close to ICI’s heart. Our expansion into the Midwest is a crucial step in our commitment to making global connections. Chicago is a deeply civic-minded city, with a long history of socially engaged practice, and one which shares ICI’s ethos across its many scenes. We are also deeply inspired by the city’s rich landscape of artist-run and small arts spaces. These organizations are often closest to their communities’ needs, and through collaboration we hope to both expand the support structures available to these communities and learn from them how to foster a deeper understanding of what curatorial practice can do and be.”
Since its founding in 1975, ICI has worked in all 50 U.S. states, and is unique among arts organizations in its ability to mobilize and make connections all across the country. While our offices may be located in New York, our network has no center, instead adopting an active, independent, and non-hierarchical approach to support our collaborators wherever they may be. In recent years, we’ve connected deeply with the arts communities of Chicago, the Midwest, and the Mississippi River basin, engaging with the curatorial landscape of the regions through many different entry points. The Chicagoland area is also our largest online audience in the world, and we are excited to further integrate our physical and digital presences through ICI’s programming offerings.
With a permanent locality in Chicago, ICI can build year-round on our important work with the city's curators, artists, and art institutions, and on our partnership with EXPO Chicago on the Curatorial Forum since 2015. The Forum features closed-door sessions for mid-career and established curators focusing on questions critical to contemporary curatorial practice, institution-building, and audience engagement, and facilitated by leaders with international recognition in the field. Finally, ICI’s expansion into Chicago is, itself, part of a larger inter-regional engagement across the Mississippi River basin. Comprising nearly 2/3 of the United States, and impacting the entire North American continent from northern Canada through the Great Lakes to the Louisiana bayou and into the Gulf of Mexico, this watershed offers a constant reminder of what is shared and the possibilities of exchange beyond state lines, borders, and barriers of all kinds. Our current Curatorial Assembly, which brings together curators from Sheboygan to New Orleans, is just one of many gatherings to come. We look forward to sharing ICI’s journeys with all of our collaborators as it evolves, and to working alongside them in new ways.
