Franco Bianchini

Franco Bianchini is Professor of Cultural Policy and Director of the Institute for Research on Culture and the Creative Industries at the University of Hull, UK. From 2007-2016 he was Professor of Cultural Policy and Planning at Leeds Beckett University, UK.

From 2010-2014 he was a member of the team preparing the successful bid by the city of Matera, in Southern Italy, for the title of European Capital of Culture for 2019.

His research interests range from the role of culture in urban regeneration (with a particular focus on port cities and on European Cities/Capitals of Culture), to cultural diversity and interculturalism as resources for innovation in urban policy, and the development of urban cultural strategies in the context of the current political, economic and environmental crises.

Photo credits: Bram Belloni/ Forum on European Culture

Vasyl Cherepanyn

Vasyl Cherepanyn is Head of the Visual Culture Research Center (VCRC, Kyiv) and an editor of the Political Critique magazine (Ukrainian edition). He works as a lecturer at the Cultural Studies Department of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and holds a Ph.D. in philosophy (aesthetics). Also he worked as a guest lecturer at European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder), Germany, at the "Political Critique" Institute for Advanced Studies in Warsaw, Poland, and at Greifswald University, Germany.

He was also a visiting fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna, Austria. In 2015, VCRC has received the European Cultural Foundation's Princess Margriet Award for Culture for its activities. Visual Culture Research Center was also the organizer of The School of Kyiv – Kyiv Biennial 2015.

Krzystof Czyżewski

Co-founder and president of the Borderland Foundation (1990) and director of the Centre “Borderland of Arts, Cultures and Nations” in Sejny. Together with his team, in Krasnogruda on the Polish-Lithuanian border, he revitalized a manor house once belonged to Czesław Miłosz family, and initiated there an International Center for Dialog (2011).

Among his books of poetry and essays are The Path of the Borderland (2001), Line of Return (2008), Trust & Identity: A Handbook of Dialog (2011), Miłosz – Dialog – Borderland (2013), Miłosz. A Connective Tissue (2014), The Krasnogruda Bridge. A Bridge-Builder’s Toolkit (2016), and A Small Center of the World. Notes of the Practitioner of Ides (2017).

Initiator of intercultural dialogue programs in Europe, Caucasus, Israel, Central Asia, Indonesia, Bhutan and USA. Teacher and lecturer – from 2015 a visiting professor at Rutgers University and University of Bologna.

His recent theatre productions include Three Women. Metamorphosis of the Medea’s Myth in Ovid and Picasso (2014) and The Mystery of the Bridge (2015).

In 2008 he was nominated as Ambassador of European Year of Intercultural Dialog (Brussels). He is a laureate of Dan David Prize 2014 and Irena Sendlerowa Prize 2015.

Shaurya Kumar

A native of Delhi, India where he studied printmaking and painting at the College of Art; Shaurya Kumar graduated with his MFA from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 2007. Since 2001, Kumar has been involved in numerous prestigious research projects, like “The Paintings of India” (a series of 26 documentary films on the painting tradition of India); "Handmade in India" (an encyclopedia on the handicraft traditions of India); and digital restorations of 6th century Buddhist mural paintings from the caves of Ajanta.

Kumar's work has exhibited widely across the US and in countries including India, Taiwan, China, Poland, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Belgium, Bulgaria, Italy, U.K., Norway, France, Australia and Finland among many others. His works have been installed at venues including the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum (formerly Victoria & Albert Museum, Mumbai); Gallery Odyssey, Mumbai; UNM Art Museum, Albuquerque; SCA Contemporary, Albuquerque; Queens Museum, NYC; Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul; Lakeeren Gallery, Mumbai; Artifact Gallery, NYC; LACDA, Los Angeles, CA; Museum of Fine Arts, Georgia; Schneider Museum of Art, Oregon; Charleston Heights Art Center, Las Vegas; TamTam Gallery, Taiwan; Guanlan Printmaking Base, China among many others. Kumar’s work was also featured in international art fairs including India Art Fair and Dubai Art Fair.

Kumar has presented research and scholarly papers at institutions including the Art Institute of Chicago, College Art Association, SGC International, International Symposium for Electronic Arts (ISEA), International Digital Media Arts Association (iDMAa) among others.

Magdalena Moskalewicz

Magdalena Moskalewicz, born in Warsaw in 1984, is an art historian, curator, editor, and teacher who researches art from (the former) Eastern Europe from the early avant-gardes until today. In her scholarly, editorial, and curatorial work, Moskalewicz critically investigates local art histories and representations of identities in order to reshape dominant historical narratives. To that end, she served as Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral C-MAP Fellow at The Museum of Modern Art in New York, where she led a research group focusing on experimental art from Central and Eastern Europe as a part of MoMA’s global research initiative, C-MAP (2012-2015). Moskalewicz’s research-based curatorial practice brings together contemporary art, art history, critical theory, and cultural anthropology. In 2015, she curated Halka/Haiti 18°48’05″N 72°23’01″W: C.T. Jasper and Joanna Malinowska for the Polish Pavilion at the 56th Venice Biennale and edited a book of the same title (Inventory Press & Zachęta, 2015). Her recent curatorial and editorial project The Travellers: Voyage and Migration in New Art from Central and Eastern Europe examines issues of migration, displacement, and accelerated global mobility in relation to identity formation in works by artist-migrants from a number of postsocialist countries. (On view at Kumu Art Museum in Tallinn until Jan 28, 2018; book published by Lugemik, 2017.) Moskalewicz’s editorial experience includes running the Polish contemporary art monthly magazine Arteon and spearheading a number of digital humanities publications for MoMA’s digital platform for collaborative research, post.

Moskalewicz was awarded a PhD in art history from Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan for her research into Polish art of the 1960s. She has taught at Adam Mickiewicz Universty in Poznań, New York University, Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. She is currently based in Chicago, where she teaches at The School of The Art Institute of Chicago.

Ása Richardsdóttir

Ása Richardsdóttir is freelance creative producer and speaker, project leader of Ice Hot Reykjavík 2018, the biannual Nordic Dance Platform and ambassador for the Nordic Culture Fund.

Ása has led a versatile career in arts, culture, academia, banking, politics and media, during three decades. She was a television reporter at RÚV State Television Iceland, founder of theatre, Kaffileikhusid, executive director of Iceland Dance Company, president of Performing Arts Iceland and creative producer for various artistic projects. She has led various international networking events, festivals and projects and been a catalyst in bringing international attention to Icelandic performing arts and Nordic dance.

Asa has tought artistic management courses at the University of Iceland, the Iceland Academy of the Arts and at Bifröst University since the year 2001 and, since 2009 at various venues in Europe. In 2017 she co-authored a guide for artists and producers who wish to work collaboratively and internationally, which can be downloaded for free on www.itstartswithaconversation.org

Ása has a BA – honours degree in international relations and politics from the University of Kent at Canterbury, a diploma in European Cultural management / Fondation Marcel Hicter programme and finally she attained her MBA degree from Reykjavik University in 2003 After the collapse of the Icelandic bank system in 2008 she was appointed one of five directors of the board of the New Landsbankinn, the largest resurrected bank in Iceland and served on the board for 2 years. Ása is active in politics, member of the Women’s alliance and later the Social Democratic alliance and was elected as city councillor in 2014. You can connect with Ása here.

Jan Sowa

Jan Sowa is a dialectical materialist, social theorist and researcher. He studied at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland and University Paris VIII in Saint-Denis, France. He holds a PhD in sociology and a habilitation in cultural studies. His research and teaching assignments took him to several universities in Poland and abroad, recently, the University of São Paulo and Warsaw University. He is a member of the Committee on Cultural Studies of the Polish Academy of Sciences.

Jan Sowa edited and authored several books and published numerous articles in Poland and abroad (in France, United States, Mexico, Czech Republic and others). A collection of essays "A Joy Forever: Political Economy of Social Creativity", that he co-edited, including articles by Luc Boltanski, Massimiliano Tomba, Isabelle Graw and Gigi Roggero appeared with MayFly Books (London) in 2015.

Russell Willis Taylor

Russell Willis Taylor, currently Interim Vice President for Arts and Leadership at Banff Centre, is the former CEO of National Arts Strategies and former Executive Director of the English National Opera in London. Russell is an internationally known and recognized speaker and consultant.

She serves on the boards of the Salzburg Global Seminar, The Charlottesville Community Foundation, the British Council's Arts & Creative Economy Advisory Group, Fractured Atlas. and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. In 2013, Russell was honored with the International Citation of Merit by the International Society for the Performing Arts, for her lifetime achievement of distinguished service to the performing arts.

Read Russel's speech at the ELIA Leadership Symposium here.