Defne Ayas (b. Istanbul, 1976) is a curator dedicated to forging alliances with art and artists, focusing on reimagining cultural platforms and formats, primarily through embracing the live medium. Her work explores how artists can shape future vectors for reality, art, politics, and representation—whether aesthetic, geographic, political, communal, or spiritual.

Ayas has directed, cofounded, curated, and advised numerous art institutions, initiatives, and exhibition platforms globally, including in the United States, Netherlands, China and Hong Kong, South Korea, Lithuania, and Italy. She served in key roles at cultural institutions such as Director to Melly (formerly known as Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art) in Rotterdam and to Arthub Asia in Shanghai. Currently working between Berlin and New York, she is a Curator at Large at Performa, where she has been a founding curator since 2005. Her recent projects, such as Protest and Performance: A Way of Life (2023), featuring performances by Gregg Bordowitz, Pamela Sneed, Pages, Rana Hamadeh, and Göksu Kunak, reflects her commitment to the collective energy of collaborators.

Until June 2021, Ayas was the Artistic Director of the 2021 Gwangju Biennale, co-curated with Natasha Ginwala. The exhibition, titled “Minds Rising, Spirits Tuning”, delved into the dialectical space between communal and artificial intelligence, informed by feminist, queer, and Indigenous knowledge systems. This edition produced three publications, including a feminism(s) reader titled “Stronger Than Bone”, and an online publishing platform, “Minds Rising”. It also featured a series of online public programs such as Rising to the Surface: Practicing Solidarity Futures, Augmented Minds and the Incomputable, and a ceremonial procession titled Through the Gates.

Founded by art historian and curator RoseLee Goldberg, Performa is the leading organization dedicated to exploring the critical role of live performance in the history of twentieth-century art and to encouraging new directions in performance for the 21st century. With its visionary Biennial and Commissions, Performa has changed the understanding and appreciation of live performance by visual artists across disciplines.

Performa Biennial
Launched in 2005 and now celebrated worldwide as the first biennial to give special attention to the remarkable history of performance in art history, the Performa Biennial transforms the city of New York into the “world capital of artists’ performance” every other November.
More details see here

IMMA, Hugh Lane Gallery and Culture Ireland are collaborating on a 3-year pilot named IRELAND INVITES, aimed at showcasing Irish visual art to the international biennale circuit.

IRELAND INVITES seeks to enhance international exposure for Irish visual artists by hosting biennale curators to undertake visits to studio and art institutions in Ireland. During their visit curators will have the opportunity to enhance their understanding of contemporary art practices in Ireland availing of the curatorial expertise of IMMA, Hugh Lane Gallery and Culture Ireland, who will facilitate research and create bespoke hosted trips for each visiting curator.

More details here.