Event / 2019

Converge 45 Welcomes Artistic Director Lisa Dent

Converge 45 is pleased to announce the appointment of Lisa Dent as Artistic Director for the 2019-2021 program. Dent is based in New York, NY and is currently the Director of Cultural Production at Powerhouse Workshop, a contemporary arts center and fabrication facility opening to the public in 2020.

Dent’s curatorial roles in national museums and galleries along with a multidisciplinary non-profit arts background make her uniquely qualified to partner with Converge 45. Dent was most recently the Director of Resources & Award Programs at Creative Capital (2012-2017), leading the financial and advisory services programs and supporting artists towards the full realization of their projects. As Associate Curator of Contemporary Art at the Columbus Museum of Art, OH, Dent organized exhibitions including Stephanie Syjuco: Pattern Migration, Currents: Latifa Echakhchand Supply & Demand.

Lisa Dent succeeds Kristy Edmunds, whose three-year leadership as Guest Artistic Director shaped Converge 45’s inaugural program (YOU IN MIND 2016-18). Dent will continue the organization’s mission of catalyzing the regional contemporary arts through conversations and exhibitions from artists around the globe.

Lisa Dent has already begun studio visits with artists for her 2019-2021 program, FACING BETWEEN CENTERS, which will feature regional, national and international artists whose works engage with multiple artistic, societal and cultural communities simultaneously. The title Facing Between Centers suggests a state of intersectionality and highlights artists who explore issues of authorship, labor and globalization.

ABOUT
Lisa Dent was a Helena Rubenstein Fellow at the Museum of Modern Art, NY and has held curatorial staff positions at the New Museum of Contemporary Art, NY and the Whitney Museum of American Art, NY. She was director of the Friedrich Petzel Gallery, NY and from 2004-08 owned and managed Lisa Dent Gallery in San Francisco, CA where she presented the work of emerging and mid-career international artists. Dent received her BFA from Howard University, and MFA from NYU. She completed the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program in curatorial studies, has served on several juries and committees and is currently a board member of Triple Canopy.