Curator Highlight #1: Larry Ossei-Mensah

The Industry Insiders Series aims to highlight Art World Experts, Activists and Commentators.

Larry Ossei-Mensah is a Ghanaian-American independent curator and cultural critic who, through contemporary art, wants to redefine the way we see ourselves in the world and our environment. His writings on contemporary art subjects have been featured in multiple publications worldwide. Larry contributed in pushing the recognition of Black culture in the art industry by his coverage of now key figures in the art world - such as Derrick Adams, Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Kehinde Wiley, Lorna Simpson and Mickalene Thomas – and by including emerging black artists in his exhibitions, thus helping new voices get discovered.

Named one of the seven curators to watch in 2019 by Cultured Magazine, Larry organised programmes and exhibitions at commercial and non-profit spaces internationally. He is a recipient of a Warhol Foundation grant for his exhibition at the Museum of African Diaspora in San Francisco named Coffee, Rhum, Sugar, Gold: A Postcolonial Paradox, co-curated with Dexter Wimberly. Ossei-Mensah went on to contribute the Ghanaian Pavilion for the 2019 Venice Biennale. His contributions included an essay on Lynette Yiadom-Boakye– a visual artist known for her portraits of fictitious figures in muted colours.

Larry Ossei-Mensah is also the co-founder of ARTNOIR– a global collective of culturalists who design multimodal experiences aimed to engage this generation's dynamic and diverse creative class. Currently, the organisation is partnered with the 50 State Initiative and For Freedoms– a platform for civic engagement, discourse and direct action for artists in the United States. The FOR FREEDOMS X ARTNOIR project worked towards more representation and a more transparent government.

Ossei-Mensah will be co-curating this years' Athens Biennale. Entitled ECLIPSE, the seventh edition of the Biennale which has been postponed to 2021 due to COVID-19 and will take place in various locations in Athens. This display will engage with the political, social and spiritual changes of today's construct and in Athens– a growing metropolis located at the intersection of Europe, Africa and Asia historically and physically, while featuring art from North and South America. This experience serves as a catalyst in re-evaluating unresolved events from the past to inform our present and use it to shape our future. A key discussion point will question: Is the West in decline or in a moment of significant transformation?

Follow Larry on Instagram, Twitter and Linkedin

Website: www.larryosseimensah.com

Learn more: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/12/arts/ossei-mensah-detroit-art.html