Robyn Farrell

WORK HISTORY

EDUCATION

SKILLS

ABOUT ROBYN FARRELL

As Senior Curator and Director of Curatorial Affairs at The Kitchen in New York, Robyn Farrell oversees exhibitions and live programs as well as community, archive, and online initiatives. From 20••••23 she worked at the Art Institute of Chicago, most recently as Associate Curator in the Department of Modern and Contemporary Art. Farrell served on the curatorial teams for over fifty exhibitions and special projects with artists Andrea Fraser, David Hockney, Amar Kanwar, Rodney McMillian, Bridget Riley, Zhang Peili, Anri Sala, Cauleen Smith, Diana Thater, and Kara Walker, among others. Her research interests include conceptual art and the moving image, emerging disciplines of time-based art, and artist networks surrounding video and performance art. Farrell’s curatorial work tracks the development of durational work and the distribution of art since the second half of the 20th century. This includes distinct televisual and video operations from artists that include Gerry Schum, Barbara Kruger, Dara Birnbaum, Gretchen Bender, Gregg Bordowitz, and Martine Syms. Recent exhibitions include Christine Sun Kim: Cues on Point and Maren Hassinger: This Is How We Grow (both 2023) at the Art Institute of Chicago, The Kitchen in Focus: Sheryl Sutton at 47 Canal (2024), and Lisa Alvarado: Shape of Artifact Time (2025) at The Kitchen at Westbeth (2025). In 2024, Farrell organized programs with Lynn Hershman Leeson and Patricia Domínguez as part of The Kitchen\'s online program, Video Viewing Room (VVR). Farrell is an internationally recognized scholar on the work of German filmmaker and video art pioneer Gerry Schum, including his landmark art on television broadcasts such as Land Art (1969). She has contributed to numerous publications and artist monographs, and has spoken widely on contemporary art and time-based media. Farrell holds a BFA in Art History from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and an MA in Art History from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2013), where she has served as a visiting lecturer and moderator for the Gene Siskel Film Center.