COLOGNE.- Chus Martínez, will curate the KölnSkulptur #9 in the Skulpturenpark Köln (Sculpture Park Cologne) for its 20th anniversary, opening 15 October 2017.

The Skulpturenpark Köln was founded in 1997 through the private initiative of Michael and Eleonore Stoffel. It has since realized over one hundred and fifty new pieces by major artists ranging from Rosemarie Trockel, Louise Bourgeois, Jenny Holzer, Isa Genzken, Dan Graham, Fischli and Weiss, George Condo and many others for the exhibition series KölnSkulptur.

The Park’s commitment to sculpture, combined with their biennial invitation to curators to rethink this open air art space anew, has produced site that is unique. The KölnSkulptur exhibitions have garnered a national and international reputation, not only because of the importance of the pieces exhibited, but also because of the relationships these form with the land: the context provides an uncommon opportunity to consider an artistic language capable of expressing how form and scale and a relationship with nature may help us to reflect on the future of life and culture being one.

The 15th of October 2017 will see the opening of KölnSkulptur #9, showing the ninth exhibition of outdoor sculptures at Skulpturenpark Köln and celebrating its 20th anniversary of the Park.

Born in Spain, Chus Martínez has a background in philosophy and art history. Currently Chus Martínez is the Head of the Institute of Art of the FHNW Academy of Arts and Design in Basel, Switzerland. Her book Club Univers has been recently published by Sternberg Press, and preparing a selection of essays with Verlag Matthes & Seitz Berlin.

Martínez has been the Chief Curator at El Museo Del Barrio, New York. She was dOCUMENTA (13) Head of Department, and Member of the Core Agent Group. Previously she was Chief Curator at MACBA, Barcelona (2008 to 2011), Director of the Frankfurter Kunstverein (2005–08) and Artistic Director of Sala Rekalde, Bilbao (2002–05). For the 56th Biennale di Venezia (2015), Martínez curated the National Pavilion of Catalonia, with a solo project of filmmaker Albert Serra, and for the 51st edition the Cyprus National Pavilion (2005).

In 2014/15 she served as curatorial “alliance” for the current edition of the Istanbul Biennial (2015); in 2008 served as a Curatorial Advisor for the Carnegie International and in 2010 for the 29th Bienal de São Paulo. During her tenure as Director of the Frankfurter Kunstverein she curated solo exhibitions of Wilhelm Sasnal among others; and a series of group exhibitions including Pensée Sauvage and The Great Game To Come. She was also the founder of the Deutsche Börse Residency Program for international artists, art writers and curators.

While at MACBA Martínez curated the Thomas Bayrle retrospective, an Otolith Group monographic show, and an exhibition devoted to television, “Are you ready for TV?”. In 2008 Martínez was the curator of the Deimantas Narkevicius retrospective exhibition, “The Unanimous Life” at the Museo de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, which traveled to major European museums. Among her recent projects are the exhibitions “The Metabolic Age” in September 2015-February 2016 at Malba in Buenos Aires and “Undisturbed Solitude” with Flora Klein, Emil Michael Klein, Tiphanie Mall and Johannes Willi at Künstler Haus Hamburg from February to April 2016.

Martínez lectures and writes regularly including numerous catalogue texts and critical essays, and is a regular contributor to Artforum among other international journals.

In 2016, she curated “Idiosincracy. Anchovies Dream of an Olive Mausoleum”, a one-year exhibition at the Helga de Alvear Foundation in Cáceres, Spain. She is also in charge of the commissions at der TANK, the exhibition space of the Art Institute in Basel where she curated “In Revolution”, a project by Mathilde Rosier (June 2016) and is currently preparing another two commissions by Ingela Ihrmann (SE) in June and Eduardo Navarro (AR), November, 2017.