Spanish architect, educator and writer Andrés Jaque, founder of Office for Political Innovation, has been named as the Chief Curator of the 13th Shanghai Biennale which will be held from November 13, 2020 to March 28, 2021.

The official announcement has been made by the Shanghai Biennale and it said: "after careful consideration and with the broad support from the Academic Committee of the Power Station of Art, as well as receiving confirmation from the Shanghai Municipal Administration of Culture and Tourism, Spanish curator, architect, and writer Andrés Jaque has been appointed the Chief Curator of the 13th Shanghai Biennale."

Andrés Jaque, 48, was born in Spain and currently lives in New York and works as the Director of the Advanced Architectural Design Program at Columbia University. 

In 2013, Jaque founded the Office for Political Innovation, based in New York and Madrid, which operates at the intersection between architecture and art, focusing on the exploration of how different bodies, technologies, and environments converge to form interspecies alliances. 

Office for Political Innovation's recent proposal for an experimental school in Madrid. Image courtesy of Andres Jacque / Office for Political Innovation

"It will be my priority that the city of Shanghai is not only a venue but also a fundamental actor in the discourse, content, and experience of the Shanghai Biennale," said Andrés Jaque. 

"I very much look forward to working with agile artists to develop new productions in response to specific sites."

"New commissions will also be conceived with Shanghai-based groups, collectives, associations, or professionals, as a way to assemble different kinds of sensitivity and knowledge through art-making, and moreover, as a way to empower the legacy the Biennale leaves for the social tissues the city is constituted on."

The PSA’s Academic Committee believes that Andrés Jaque excels at establishing connections between art and the public through his frequent interdisciplinary collaborations with artists, scientists, architects, historians, ecologists, and other like-minded individuals. 

Furthermore, his concept of spatial interventions and development of historical depth naturally connect the PSA with Shanghai’s civic infrastructure, allowing the Biennale to occupy the city and to stimulate the public’s imagination and discussions surrounding local experiences in Shanghai and human civilization as a whole.

The theme of the 13th Shanghai Biennale will be announced in January 2020. Recruitment for the Biennale’s City Projects will also be officially launched at that time.

Top image: Andrés Jaque. Courtesy of the curator © Miguel de Guzmán.

> via Shanghai Biennale