Fine Art Research Unit (FARU) Talk: Rosie Cooper, Director of Wysing Arts Centre

Rosie Cooper (she/her) will talk about her unconventional route into curating – from drag clubs of 1990s London to finding out that being a Curator is actually a job, and that you could get paid to do it, fifteen years later.

Rosie Cooper is a cultural organiser who works collaboratively with artists, thinkers, activists and communities to cultivate the freewheeling imagination and build equity. She has been Director of Wysing Arts Centre since September 2021, a multi-artform arts centre in the middle of the Cambridgeshire countryside that hosts a national and international residency programme, gatherings and events, an ambitious programme of commissions, and a youth-led learning programme.

Since her arrival, she has developed an approach for the organisation centred around sharing resources generously, for artists and publics alike. This has included a significant new public art commission by Rafał Zajko, working with 270 year 7 pupils at St Peters School, Huntingdon, a mini-festival considering culture's entangled relationship with the land, and 'Club Urania' a new LGBTQ+ performance night produced in collaboration with Cambridge Junction. Prior to that, she was Head of Exhibitions at the De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea, leading the organisation into an ambitious new phase of arts programming. Whilst there, she curated the group exhibitions Still I Rise Feminisms, Gender, Resistance Acts 1–3 with Irene Aristizábal and Cédric Fauq, and How Chicago! Imagists 1960s & 70s with Sarah McCrory. She commissioned solo exhibitions by artists including Alison Wilding, Holly Hendry, Zadie Xa, Hayv Kahraman, Tamar Guimarães and Kasper Akhøj, and Mikhail Karikis with Project Art Works. From 2012-16 she was Head of Programmes at Liverpool Biennial, the UK's largest international contemporary art festival. She is a Trustee of IntoArt and Chair of Home Live Art. Rosie Cooper is a judge of the 2024 Turner Prize, in its 25th anniversary year.

The event is free and open to the public - all are welcome! Can't join us on campus? Join via Microsoft Teams here.