Conversations with Curators: Nici Cumpston on relationships and conversations

“Each curator is unique like every artist is unique, I believe,” says Nici Cumpston, who holds the dual positions of Curator of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art at the Art Gallery of South Australia and artistic director of TARNATHI. Not to mention that Cumpston, a Barkindji woman of Afghan and European descent, is also an artist, educator and writer. In this podcast, the second of four episodes which focus on contemporary curating, Cumpston discusses how for her curating is a mixture of aesthetic, cultural, political and educative roles, at the centre of which lie community, relationships and conversation. “For me I need to have a good understanding of the artists work,” she says. “I need to build a relationship with the artist that I’m working with and I like togive them the opportunity to excel themselves.” Cumpston further talks through her pre-art life, how she eventually found herself at AGSA, the larger aspirations behind curating, and the changes she’s noticed in the arts as an Indigenous curator during the last decade. See more at Art Guide Australia online: www.artguide.com.au Podcast produced by Tiarney Miekus. Engineered by Mino Peric. Music by Jesse Warren.

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