Plug In ICA is pleased to welcome a delegation of six curators of contemporary art from France: Alexandra Baudelot, co-director of les Laboratoires d’Aubervilliers; Marie Cozette, director of La Synagogue de Delme; Laurence Gateau, director of the FRAC Pays-de-la-Loire; Marta Ponsa, head of the department of artistic projects and cultural activities at the Jeu de Paume; Claire Le Restif, director of the Centre d’art contemporain d’Ivry-le Crédac; and Vincent Verlé, director of Centre d’Art Bastille.

As part of their visit to artists’ studios and Winnipeg art institutions, the curators will be speaking about their recent work and current projects as well as aspects of the programs of their respective institutions in room 4BC55 in the Buhler Centre, 460 Portage Avenue, on Wednesday, June 11, at 7:00pm. The event will be followed by a rooftop reception at Plug In ICA. The event is free and all are welcome.

Alexandra Baudelot is co-director of les Laboratoires d’Aubervilliers (in the northern suburbs of Paris), prior to which she worked as exhibition curator, editor and author. In 2009 she created and managed the contemporary art platform Rosascape, an independent art centre based in Paris, where she curated exhibitions with Katinka Bock, Ulla von Brandenburg, Raymond Gervais, Benoît Maire, Vittorio Santoro, Berger&Berger, and Adrian Dan. She is interested in production strategies, the artistic research process and reflections on the role of artwork and ways of sharing it with the public – through formats such as exhibits, performances, conferences, and publications – and across disciplines.

Marie Cozette is director of La Synagogue de Delme, an art centre located in a rural and economically disadvantaged area in Eastern France. She co-founded Bétonsalon, an independent art space in Paris in 2004. At La synagogue de Delme she has curated numerous solo exhibitions (Susan Hiller, Marie Cool Fabio Balducci, Louise Hervé and Chloé Maillet, Erick Beltran, Eric Baudelaire, Edith Dekyndt, Yona Friedman, Julien Prévieux, Katinka Bock) and collaborated with guest curators or artists (Mathieu Copeland, Anna Colin, Mathieu Kleyebe Abonnenc) to conceive collective exhibitions on themes like identity, migration, the politics of sound and ethnomusicology. She also teaches exhibitions’ history at the Metz Art School.

Laurence Gateau is director of the FRAC Pays-de-la-Loire (regional contemporary art museum and collections). Prior to this position, she directed various art centres in France, most notably Villa Arson Nice from 2000 to 2004, where she curated numerous exhibitions of senior international artists (Roman Signer, Gary Hill, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Cildo Meireles, Mona Hatoum, Alain Séchas, Paul McCarthy, Mark Lewis, Simon Starling, De Rijke/De Rooij, Fiona Tan, Saâdane Afif) with a special survey exhibition on Chinese artists in 2004. At the FRAC she has curated exhibitions with, among others, Thomas Huber, Fabrice Hyber, Monica Bonvicini, Gina Pane, Tatiana Trouvé, Martin Boyce, Jean-Michel Sanejouand, and Marc Camille Chaimowicz.

Marta Ponsa is head of the department of artistic projects and cultural activities at the Jeu de Paume, Paris. Earlier on, she worked for eight years at the department of photography and visual arts of the “La Caixa” Foundation in Barcelona where she worked on shows of Richard Avedon, Lee Friedlander, Ed van der Elsken, Doug Aitken and Pierrick Sorin among many others. She has curated several exhibitions on European photography from the 1920s to the 1950s, as well as on video and new media for the Jeu de Paume and its online exhibition space, “Espace Virtuel” (Mark Lewis,  Samuel Bianchini, Agnès de Cayeux, Magali Daniaux et Cédric Pigot).

Claire Le Restif has been director of the Centre d’art contemporain d’Ivry-le Crédac, France since 2003, where she has worked with artists such as Lara Almarcegui, Leonor Antunes, Mircea Cantor, Peter Coffin, Koenraad Dedobbeleer, Aurélien Froment, Geert Goiris, Friedrich Kunath, Mathieu Mercier, Bojan Sarcevic, and Jessica Warboys. She has organized exhibitions for numerous other venues, including Attitudes, Genève; Kunsthausbaselland, Basel; Smack Mellon Center, Brooklyn, NY; Kunsthalle Palazzo, Basel; AKSANAT Art Center, Istanbul; Kunstverein, Nürnberg; and Academia de Bellas Artes, Madrid.

Vincent Verlé moved to Grenoble in 2001 where he worked to integrate and manage the artistic collective “Ici Même”. He became art critic for a local cultural weekly, while at the same time collaborating as one of the contributors for “Nouvelle Galerie”, a contemporary art gallery in Grenoble. In 2006, when the Centre d’Art Bastille was created, he joined the team as manager for public programs before becoming the art centre’s curator, and then its director (in 2011). There he continues to focus on composing and creating coherent approaches and dialogues towards and between the artworks—an approach to programming he had initiated in 2007.

France-Winnipeg: A Curatorial Conversation is organized by the French Cultural Services in Canada in partnership with the Institut français and the Canada Council for the Arts.