New Appointment

17. Februar 2023

Renée Mussai joins The Walther Collection as Artistic Director and Chief Curator

We are delighted to announce the appointment of London-based curator, writer and art historian Renée Mussai as the first Artistic Director of The Walther Collection, and its new Chief Curator. The double role will comprise leading the Collection's curatorial, editorial and scholarly initiatives, alongside shaping its future artistic programme vision and new acquisitions.

An established research-led curator and scholar of photography and lens-based media, Renée joins The Walther Collection with more than 20 years’ experience in the arts, following two decades as senior curator and head of curatorial & collection at Autograph, London – a position enhanced by a rich track-record of independent curating, publishing, writing and teaching internationally.

Working between London, New York and Neu-Ulm, Renée will be responsible for The Walther Collection’s wide-ranging international activities, with a focus on expanding the scope of its publishing program, collection development, and travelling exhibitions through institutional collaborations.

“I am thrilled to be joining the Walther Collection at such a pivotal moment and consider it a great privilege to build on the brilliant work undertaken by esteemed colleagues – friends and collaborators – since the foundation’s inception in 2010. Having had the opportunity to engage with the Collection as curatorial consultant in the past, I am deeply excited, and honored, to lead the next chapter of this remarkable cultural resource, continuing Artur Walther’s long-standing commitment to supporting diverse visual practices and amplifying the Collection’s exceptional dual scholarly and curatorial remit. I look forward to forge new partnerships, engage artists and academics, and develop artistic programmes that will offer new knowledge to continuously expand the field and push its boundaries for photography and moving image communities globally.” – Renée Mussai

Renée Mussai is a London-based curator, writer and scholar of photography and lens-based media with a special interest in African and Afro-diasporic black feminist and queer visual arts practices. The former senior curator and head of curatorial & collection at Autograph, London (an arts charity with a remit in photography and film addressing cultural identity, race, representation, social justice and human rights), Mussai was responsible for a wide range of critically acclaimed exhibitions, artist commissions, research initiatives and publications and has organised numerous solo and group shows in Europe, Africa and America over the past two decades, including immersive gallery installations for Zanele Muholi’s Somnyama Ngonyama—Hail the Dark Lioness’ (2017 – 2021); Phoebe Boswell’s ‘The Space Between Things’ (2018); and veteran Ghanaian photographer James Barnor’s first-ever retrospective ‘Ever Young’ (2010), amongst many others. Alongside her research-led curatorial practice, she lectures and publishes widely on photography and visual activism. Her publications include Lina Iris Viktor's award-winning monograph Some Are Born to Endless Night—Dark Matter (2020) and the forthcoming Eyes That Commit: Black Women and Non-Binary Photographers—A Visual Survey’ (Prestel, 2023) and ‘Black Chronicles—Photography, Race, and Difference in Victorian Britain’ (Autograph, 2024). Mussai was regular guest curator and non-resident Fellow at the Hutchins Centre for African and African American Research at Harvard University between 2009 and 2018 and is currently Research Associate at the Visual Identities in Art and Design Research Centre, University of Johannesburg; Associate Lecturer at University of the Arts London; and doctoral candidate in the department of art history at University College London.