Srimoyee Mitra, Director, Stamps Gallery, University of Michigan

Srimoyee Mitra is a curator and writer whose work is invested in building empathy and mutual respect by bringing together meaningful and diverse works of art and design. She develops ambitious and socially relevant projects that mobilize the agency within creative practices and public audiences. Her research interests lie at the intersection of exhibition-making and participation, migration, globalization and decolonial aesthetics. Mitra has worked as an Arts Writer for publications in India such as Time Out, Mumbai ,and Art India Magazine. She was the Programming Co-ordinator of the South Asian Visual Arts Centre (2008-2010) in Toronto, where her curatorial projects included Crossing Lines: An Intercultural Dialogue at the Glenhyrst Art Gallery, Brantford. In 2011, she was appointed the Curator of Contemporary Art, Art Gallery of Windsor, where she developed an award-winning curatorial and publications program. Her exhibitions Border Cultures (2013-2015), We Won’t Compete (2014), Wafaa Bilal: 168:01 (2016) were awarded “Exhibition of the Year” by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries for three consecutive years. In 2015, she edited a multi-authored book, Border Cultures, co-published by the Art Gallery of Windsor and Black Dog Publishing and her writing can be found in journals such as Scapegoat Journal, Fuse and C Magazines.

 Speakers

Madhuvanti Ghose, Alsdorf Associate Curator of Indian, Southeast Asian, and Himalayan Art, Arts of Asia, Art Institute of Chicago

Dr. Madhuvanti Ghose is the inaugural Alsdorf Associate Curator of Indian, Southeast Asian, and Himalayan Art, Arts of Asia. Since joining the museum in 2007, she opened the Alsdorf Galleries in 2008 and has curated numerous exhibitions and installations, including Jitish Kallat’s site-specific Public Notice 3 (2010–11), Gates of the Lord: The Tradition of Krishna Paintings (2015–16), Vanishing Beauty: Asian Jewelry and Ritual Objects from the Barbara and David Kipper Collection (2016), and India Modern: The Paintings of M. F. Husain (2017–18), among many others. From 2012 to 2016 she led the Vivekananda Memorial Program for Museum Excellence, funded by the government of India and designed to foster professional exchange between the Art Institute and museums in India. She served on the board of trustees of the American Association of Art Museum Curators from 2016 to 2021.

Prior to joining the Art Institute, Madhuvanti was a lecturer in South Asian Art and Archaeology at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, and a research fellow at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford University. She completed her doctoral dissertation at the University of London and has been honored with a 2013 Breaking Barriers Award from the Chicago Foundation for Women, the 2014 Outstanding Community Service Award from the Vishwa Gujarati Samaj, USA, and a 2020 fellowship with the Center for Curatorial Leadership (CCL).

Michelle LaVallee, Director, Department of Indigenous Ways and Decolonization National Gallery of Canada

Michelle LaVallee is Anishinaabe (Ojibway) and a member of the Neyashiingamiing Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation, and has Canadian Settler heritage of English/Scottish/French descent from her mother.

She currently holds the inaugural position of Director of the Indigenous Ways and Decolonization Department and of Curatorial Initiatives at the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa. Previously she was Director of the Indigenous Art Centre at Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada (2017-2022), and Curator at the MacKenzie Art Gallery in Regina, Saskatchewan (2007-2017).  Her career is dedicated to championing Indigenous art and artists and exploring the colonial relations that have shaped historical and contemporary culture through numerous exhibitions, notably: Radical Stitch (2022-2025, co-curated with Sherry Farrell Racette and Cathy Mattes) and 7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc. (2013-2016). Guided by decolonial and Indigenous methodologies, she works to challenge historical relationships with art and history institutions towards new ways of engaging with people, space, and the land. LaVallee has participated in a number of Canadian Indigenous Curators Delegations internationally and her work has been recognized widely, including with three Saskatchewan Book Awards.

James McAnally, Executive and Artistic Director, Counterpublic

James McAnally is the Executive and Artistic Director of Counterpublic. Previously, McAnally was the co-founder and executive director of The Luminary, an expansive platform for art, thought, and action based in St. Louis, MO. He is additionally the co-founder and editor of MARCH: a journal of art and strategy (formerly Temporary Art Review) and was a founding member of Common Field, a national network of artist organizations and organizers.

McAnally has presented exhibitions, talks and lectures at venues such as the Walker Art Center, Queens Museum, the Pulitzer Arts Foundation with Ballroom Marfa, The Contemporary, Baltimore, and has served as a Visual Arts panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts, Creative Capital, Joan Mitchell Foundation and numerous other fellowships. His publications are in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Smithsonian Museum of American Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Brooklyn Museum, Getty Research Institute and more and his writing has been published in Art in America, Artnet, Art Journal, BOMB Magazine and others. McAnally is a recipient of the Creative Capital | Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant for Short-Form Writing.