CHIEF CURATOR

KEMPER MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART

Jessica Hong is a curator and cultural worker who has dedicated her practice to highlighting under-recognized narratives and stimulating generational change within institutional sites. She is interested in rethinking curatorial practice to center the support of artists, mentorship, to build upon community, facilitate critical dialogues, while foregrounding collaboration and equity. 

Hong is the newly-appointed Chief Curator at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art in Kansas City, MO. She is formerly the Senior Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Toledo Museum of Art where she was responsible for broadening art historical narratives and shaping a dynamic collection and exhibitions program. At the TMA, she organized the premiere of Stan Douglas’s major film installation Doppelgänger in a U.S. institution, Living Legacies: Art of the African American South, and Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg–Machine Auguries: Toledo, the artist’s first U.S. solo presentation. In the lead-up to the Museum’s historic reinstallation, Hong acquired key works by Pacita Abad, Huguette Caland, Teresita Fernández, Jeffrey Gibson, Kerry James Marshall, Isaac Julien, Ana Mendieta, Mickalene Thomas, Remedios Varo, the museum’s first digital artwork by Osinachi, among others. Additionally, she worked on inaugurating TMA’s digital artist residency in which she served as artistic director and, in 2022, she was awarded Toledo’s 20 Under 40, which recognizes leaders in the community.

ASSISTANT CURATOR

BROOKLYN MUSEUM

CENTER FOR FEMINIST ART

Currently the Curatorial Assistant in the Brooklyn Museum's Center for Feminist Art, Carla Forbes supports the Center’s curatorial team in creating exhibitions that forefront artists who engage feminist methodologies and frameworks, such as María Madalena Campos-Pons, Nona Faustine, and Elizabeth Catlett.

Prior to their work at the Brooklyn Museum, Forbes has held a range of experiences in education, visitor engagement, and curatorial capacities across several institutions including The Oakland Museum of California, the De Young Museum, and The Museum of the African Diaspora.

Motivated by Black Queer Feminist theory, Forbes is interested in centering the practices and experiences of artists and publics of the African diaspora, while shaping anti-oppressive arts and culture ecosystems that struggle towards more liberatory psychic, social, and civic potentials, both inside and beyond institutional boundaries.

Forbes is an inaugural alum of the Studio Museum in Harlem Arts Leadership Praxis, and is currently a fellow in the Association of Art Museum Curators Professional Alliance of Curators of Color. They hold a B.A. in African and African-American Studies from Stanford University.

ARTIST

Damien Davis is a Newark-based artist and educator originally from Crowley, Louisiana, and raised in Phoenix, Arizona. His practice explores cultural representation and identity through a distinctive visual language that recontextualizes symbols from diverse cultures, challenging historical narratives and inviting new interpretations.

Davis has exhibited widely, including at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, Museum of Modern Art, and Museum of Arts and Design. He has been recognized with the Rema Hort Mann Foundation Community Engagement Grant and has participated in residencies at Project for Empty Space, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum of Art and Storytelling, among others.

Currently an Adjunct Professor at Purchase College (SUNY), Davis also holds a BFA in Studio Art and an MA in Visual Arts Administration from New York University. His work has been featured in publications such as The New York Times, Hyperallergic, and Frieze Magazine.