Aric Chen is an independent curator and writer based in Shanghai, where he is Professor of Practice and Director of the Curatorial Lab at the College of Design & Innovation at Tongji University. In addition, Chen currently serves as Curatorial Director for the Design Miami/ and Design Miami/Basel fairs; Curatorial Consultant to the Brooklyn Museum; and Curator-at-Large for M+, the new museum for visual culture under construction in Hong Kong's West Kowloon Cultural District, where from 2012-2018 he was that institution's first Lead Curator for Design and Architecture.

Prior to M+, Chen was the first Creative Director of Beijing Design Week. Over the years, he has organized dozens of projects and exhibitions internationally, in addition to serving on numerous juries, and as a curatorial advisor

to the UABB Shenzhen Biennale of Architecture\Urbanism, the Cooper-Hewitt Design Triennale (New York), and the Gwangju Design Biennale. Chen is the author of Brazil Modern (Monacelli, 2016), and has been a frequent contributor to The New York Times, Wallpaper*, Fantastic Man, Architectural Record, and other publications.

11.19 Curating as a Multi-Polar Practice

Curating has expanded well beyond its roots in the institution in response to shifts in how culture is produced, narrated, and financed. Focusing on the curation of design and architecture, this lecture will look at how curatorial practice has by necessity become increasingly malleable, as the proliferation of museums, biennales, design weeks and fairs around the world demand different approaches stretched between the poles of local and global, scholarly and commercial, and physical, virtual and social. This talk will draw on the speaker's own experience in museums and events across Asia, the US and Europe to propose a broader understanding of what it means to be a curator.