Curator and Artistic Director, Serpentine Galleries
Born in 1968 in Zurich, Hans Ulrich Obrist is artistic director of and senior adviser at LUMA Arles.
Since his first curatorial project, “World Soup: The Kitchen Show,” in 1991, he has curated more than 350 exhibitions. Most notable among these are the “Do It” series, beginning in Paris in 1993; “Take Me (I'm Yours)” in London (1995), Paris (2015), New York (2016) and Milan (2017); and the Swiss Pavilion at the 14th International Architecture Biennale in Venice (2014). He has also co-curated the “Cities on The Move” series (1996–2000); “Laboratorium” in Antwerp (1999); the operatic group exhibition “Il Tempo del Postino” in Manchester (2007) and Basel (2009); and the “11, 12, 13, 14, 15 Rooms” series (2011–2015).
Mr. Obrist's recent exhibitions include “Enzo Mari” at Triennale Milano (2020) and “WORLDBUILDING” at the Centre Pompidou-Metz (2023) and the Julia Stoschek Collection in Düsseldorf (2022). “The Handwriting Project,” which protests the disappearance of handwriting in the digital age, has been taking place on Instagram since 2013.
In 2011, he received the CCS Bard Award for Curatorial Excellence, and in 2015 he was awarded the International Folkwang Prize. Most recently he was honoured by the Appraisers Association of America with the 2018 Award for Excellence in the Arts.
Mr. Obrist has lectured internationally at academic and art instit and is a contributing editor to several magazines and journals. His recent publications include “Ways of Curating” (2015); “The Age of Earthquakes: A Guide to the Extreme Present” (2015); “Lives of the Artists, Lives of the Architects” (2015); “The Extreme Self: Age of You” (2021); “140 Artists’ Ideas for Planet Earth” (2021); “Archipelago” with Édouard Glissant (2021); “Ever Gaia” with James Lovelock (2023); “Remember to Dream! 100 Artists, 100 Notes” (2023); and “Une vie in progress” (2023).
Photo Credit: Elias Hassos
