MOCA appeared like a revolving door of administrators who switched from Jeremy Strick to Jeffrey Deitch to Philippe Vergne and Biesenbach. As well as, there have been the stormy public exits of the chief curators Paul Schimmel and Helen Molesworth. And the museum survived a raid on its basis to pay the payments and a proposed merger with the Los Angeles County Museum of Artwork.
“I am not totally stunned that this was so short-lived – it appears very troublesome there,” mentioned Kristy Edmunds, government and creative director of UCLA’s Heart for the Artwork of Efficiency. “Now we’re bringing MOCA right into a full place of help for Johanna to hold the baton ahead.”
The day earlier than the announcement of Biesenbach’s departure, he was there to announce the opening of a brand new exhibition by Swiss video artist Pipilotti Rist at Geffen Up to date, MOCA’s warehouse in downtown Los Angeles. It was a singular exhibition that had been within the works for nearly three years, and Biesenbach co-chaired the press convention with Rist earlier than opening the doorways to the maze of their movies. He gave no indication that this may be his final public second at MOCA or the upcoming announcement from Berlin.
Born in Germany, Biesenbach, 55, got here to Los Angeles after having been director of MoMA PS1 since 2009. In 2006 he was appointed curator of the Museum of Trendy Artwork in New York. And at 25 he was one of many founders of the Institute for Up to date Artwork der Kunst-Werke in Berlin, the place he started his museum profession.
To some extent, Biesenbach appears to be following controversy. At MoMA, whereas cultivating the avant-garde, he was additionally identified for some attention-grabbing reveals of questionable curatorial significance, particularly a retrospective by the Icelandic music artist Björk in 2015 and the Marina Abramovic present “The Artist Is Current” in 2010.
In 2018, he was named in a criticism to the New York Human Rights Fee accusing MoMA PS1 of gender, being pregnant and caregiver discrimination (the case was finally settled).
