Glenn D. Lowry
Dr Glenn D. Lowry, the sixth director of The Museum of Modern Art, directs an active programme of exhibitions, acquisitions, and publications. A strong advocate for contemporary art, he has lectured and written extensively in support of contemporary art, artists and the role of museums in society, among other topics. He is a member of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s board of trustees and serves on the advisory council of the Department of Art History and Archaeology at Columbia University.
In Between Places: Making contemporary art in the Middle East
In Between Places takes as its point of departure the fact that contemporary art in the Middle East can be seen as either the continuation of a historical tradition of Islamic art or as a radical break with the past; as a market driven phenomenon fueled by the wealth of a new Gulf- based clientele, or a searing critique of the social and political conditions of the region often made by artists living in a diasporic condition. The lecture uses the idea of “in betweeness” as a social, political and geographical metaphor to argue how many artists from the region have developed strategies to make art that is at once rooted in local concerns and engaged with universal issues.