Curator

A curator of a cultural heritage institution (e.g. archive, gallery, library or museum) is a person who cares for the institution's collections.

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In the United Kingdom, the term is also applied to government employees who monitor the quality of contract archaeological work under PPG 16 and are considered to manage the cultural resource of a region.

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In contemporary art, the curator is the person who organizes an exhibition. Thus, to curate means to arrange a collection to achieve a desired effect. A new figure in contemporary art is the freelance curator, who does not have affiliation with any particular gallery or museum. Harald Szeemann of Switzerland is a good example of such a curator.

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Today, as art institutions face an array of new challenges – management and financial to media and digital related – the role of the curator is being re-thought. One consequence of this has been the emergence of academic courses in contemporary art and curatorial practice (Royal College of Art, UK/ Bard College USA etc.). Independent curators can develop their own idiosyncratic methods for exhibition, be invited by museums and galleries to curate exhibitions in their spaces or operate in hybrid roles (publishing, collecting, installing, designing etc). 'Tactical Curating' is a term used by independent curator Roger McDonald (based in Tokyo with Arts Initiative Tokyo) to refer to the peculiar characteristics and advantages of operating independently.

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Cultural: REDIRECT Culture...

Archive: Archives refers to a collection of records with specific characteristics, and also refers to the location in which these records are kept. Records, which may be in any media, are normally unpublished, unlike books and other publications. Archives can be personal, and as such are sometimes referred ...

Gallery: Gallery can refer to several things:...