Laura Raicovich

Save the date for ART PAPERS LIVE: Laura Raicovich – Manifesting the Neutral

Independent curator and writer Laura Raicovich considers where ideas of the neutral come from and how they are manifested within museums and cultural institutions, both implicitly and explicitly. She will specifically address the ways in which neutrality is a fiction, and how it can be used to veil exclusion and bias. Raicovich suggests that in order to make cultural institutions more accessible, diverse, and inclusive it is imperative to confront this myth of neutrality to collectively imagine such spaces in the future. The talk is based on her forthcoming book from Verso on museums and the myth of neutrality.

Laura Raicovich is a writer and curator. She is currently working on a book about museums, cultural institutions, and the myth of neutrality (Verso, 2020) which will delve into how art and museums that embody complexity, poetics, and care can create a more thoughtful and equitable civic realm. She is also a Rockefeller Foundation Fellow at the Bellagio Center and the recipient of the inaugural Emily H. Tremaine Journalism Fellowship for Curators at Hyperallergic.

Until early 2018, she served as President and Executive Director of the Queens Museum where she oversaw an inviting and vital commons for art, ideas, and engagement. In 2018, she co-curated Mel Chin: All Over the Place (with Manon Slome and No Longer Empty), which occupied the entire Queens Museum and multiple public sites across the city.

Prior to her three years at the Queens Museum, Raicovich inaugurated Creative Time’s Global Initiatives, and worked for a decade at Dia Art Foundation, where she served as deputy director. She has also held positions at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Public Art Fund, and New York City’s Department of Parks and Recreation. Raicovich lectures internationally and has published a number of books including as co-editor (with Carin Kuoni and Kareem Estefan) “Assuming Boycott: Resistance, Agency, and Cultural Production” (OR Books/Vera List Center for Art and Politics, 2017); and as author of “At the Lightning Field” (Coffee House Press, 2017) and “A Diary of Mysterious Difficulties” (Publication Studio, 2014). She graduated from Swarthmore College and holds a Master’s Degree in Liberal Studies from the Graduate Center at the City University of New York.

This event is free and open to the public, but your RSVP is required.