Elena Sorokina

Elena Sorokina is a curator, art historian and writer based in Paris and Brussels. She was part of the curatorial team for documenta 14 and co-curator of the Armenian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale (2022). She served as chief curator of the HISK Higher Institute of Fine Arts, Belgium in 2017–2019. As independent curator, Sorokina has organised projects at BOZAR Centre for Fine Arts, Art Brussels, and WIELS, Brussels; Centre Pompidou and Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris; SMBA Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Galerie Rudolfinum, Prague; and Pera Museum, Istanbul, among others.

Education Sorokina studied art history at the Freie Universität in Berlin and the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität in Bonn, where she completed her masters. In 2004-2005, she attended the curatorial studies of the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program (ISP), which culminated with the final exhibition "At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care". She was in the first selection of the Young Curators Residency Programme at the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Turin, in 2007.

Career Sorokina started her career in the United States, curating exhibitions at White Columns, Art in General and YBCA San Francisco.

She served as curatorial advisor for documenta 14 in Kassel, Germany and Athens, Greece. the only project of documenta 14 in Thessaloniki, Greece. It featured the work of O+A (Bruce Odland/Sam Auinger) and took place at the Rotunda of Galerius (early 4th century AD) and Navarino Square.

In 2017, Sorokina was appointed the chief curator of HISK (Higher Institute for Fine Arts) in Belgium. During her mandate she organised several collaborations between HISK and other institutions such as Art Brussels (with a special project Mystic Properties, for the 50th Anniversary edition of Art Brussels ), and The Swamp School of the Lithuanian Pavilion at the Venice International Architecture Biennale.

In 2020, she co-founded an independent project, Initiatives for Practices and Visions of Radical Care, with Natasa Petresin-Bachelez, Head of Artistic and Cultural Programme at Cité internationale des arts in Paris. In 2022, Sorokina co-curated the Armenian Pavilion

Sustainable Curating In 2020, Sorokina curated the exhibition "Crystal Clear: Travels in Sustainable Exhibition Making" at Pera Museum, Istanbul, which responded to the COVID-19 pandemic with principles of sustainability. The project was developed as a contained ecosystem of relations and a small circular economy with diverse entanglements of production, display, and recycling of artistic, curatorial, and institutional work, material and immaterial. It implemented the following sustainability principles: production of the work in collaboration with small local associations, radically reduced shipment of objects, no crating, the use of recuperated materials, and creative recycling of the exhibition after its closure.

Exhibitions and Projects

Gharib, Armenian Pavilion, 59th Venice Biennale, co-curated with Anne Davidian, 2022 Fragilités, Galerie Rudolfinum Prague, Czech Republic, co-curated with Silvia Van Espen, 2022 Crystal Clear: Travels in Sustainable Exhibition Making, Pera Museum, Istanbul, 2021 Variations on Vulnerability, Slow Compositions Between Six and Midnight, BOZAR, Brussels, co-organised with Aria Spinelli, 2018 Mystic Properties, Hotel de La Poste, Tour et Taxis, Brussels, 2018 Psycho-Vertical: Štefan Papčo, KunstHalle Bratislava, Slovakia, 2017 The Grid and the Cloud: How to Connect, Higher Institute for Fine Arts, Gent, Belgium, 2017 Museum (Science)Fictions, Centre Pompidou, Paris, 2016 Forms of Togetherness (and Separation), a Narrated Exhibition, WIELS, Brussels, 2015 Lene Berg. Portrait of a Woman with Moustache, in “Revoir Picasso”, Musée Picasso Paris, 2015 Spaces of Exception, Special project for the Moscow Biennial, co-curated with Jelle Bouwhuis, 2013 NEWTOPIA. The state of human rights, curatorial advisor to Katerina Gregos, Mechelen, Belgium, 2012 What Is a Postcolonial Exhibition?, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam and SMBA, Amsterdam, 2012 Etats de l'Artifice, Musee d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, 2010 Scènes Centrales, part of Frontières Invisibles, TriPostal, Lille, France, 2009 On Traders’ Dilemmas: Tracing Roads Through Central Asia, YBCA (Yerba Buena Center for the Arts), San Francisco, 2008 Laws of Relativity (La legge e relativa per tutti), Sandretto Re Rebaudengo Foundation, co-curated with Anna Colin, Turin, 2008 At the Mercy of Others. The Politics of Care, Whitney Museum of American Art ISP, New York, 2004

Writing Between 2000-2007, Sorokina had been writing art criticism in German for several publications including Die Tageszeitung, Frankfurter Rundschau, Wirtschaftswoche, Die Welt, Die Zeit, and later in English for e-flux, Artforum, Manifesta Journal.

'On Rocket Flowers and the Speed of Snails', in fragilités, exhibition catalogue. Czech Republic: Rudolfinum, 2022. Crystal Clear, exhibition catalogue (co-editor). Istanbul: Pera Museum, 2020. Štefan Papčo: Verticality as Fantastic Occupation, artist monograph (editor). 2019 Mystic Properties, limited edition with Kristien Daems. Brussels: HISK; ART Brussels, 2018. The Grid and the Cloud. How to Connect, exhibition catalogue (editor). Brussels: HISK, 2017. Manolo Millares, exhibition catalogue (editor). Galerie Mayoral, 2017. Newtopia: The State of Human Rights, exhibition catalogue (co-editor). Ludion, 2013. 'Performing the Documentary', in Mutations: Perspectives on Photography, 1st ed. Steidl, 2011. Pacific Perspectives', in Paradigm Shifts: Walter and McBean Galleries Exhibitions and Public Programs San Francisco Art Institute 2006-2011. San Francisco: SFAI, 2011. 'Starring Abramovic, Playing Herself, Manifesta Journal, N11, 2010. Frontières Invisibles, exhibition catalogue (co-editor). Broché, 2009. ' Performance Practice of Elena Kovylina, in 15th Biennale of Sydney: Zones of Contact. Sydney: Biennale of Sydney, 2006. Terrain Vague as a Stage: Chinese Video at PS1 in New York', Performance Art Journal, MIT Press, 2004-2005. Crude Oil Paintings, exhibition catalogue. New York: White Columns, 2004.