Draft:Kathy Noble

Kathy Noble is a British art curator and writer, currently working as senior curator at Performa, a New York non-profit dedicated to contemporary visual arts performance. She previously worked as Curator, Interdisciplinary at Tate Modern, London and specializes in performance and cross-disciplinary work.

Early life and education

Noble was born in London and attended Camden School for Girls. She holds a BA History of Art from the University of Warwick and an MA Creative Curating from Goldsmiths, University of London.

Career

Curator

Noble began her career at the Architecture Foundation, before moving to Tate Modern to work as Assistant Curator, followed by Curator, Interdisciplinary, specializing in performance and time-based media, between 2007 and 2012. There she co-curated Tate Modern Live, a program of performance commissions and experimental events with Catherine Wood, working with artists such as Michael Clark, Keren Cytter, Robert Morris, and Neue Slowenische Kunst, also launching BMW Tate Live: Performance Room, the first live streaming performance program in a museum in 2011, featuring new commissions performed live to camera by artists such as Every Ocean Hughes (formerly Emily Roysdon) and Pablo Bronstein. In 2012 Noble co-curated the inaugural program for the museum's new performance spaces The Tanks, housed in the underground chambers of the former power station's oil tanks, adapted by architects Herzog & de Meuron, with Catherine Wood and Stuart Comer. The program entitled Art in Action featured over thirty artists, including Ei Arakawa, Tania Bruguera, Boris Charmatz, Anthea Hamilton, Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker, Sung Hwan Kim, Rabih Mroué and Hito Steyerl, Lis Rhodes, Haegue Yang and Suzanne Lacy, comprising new commissions, events, and recent time-based media acquisitions from the Tate collection.

Noble later held curatorial positions at Nottingham Contemporary and Wysing Arts Center and launched the inaugural Art Night with the Institute of Contemporary Arts, presenting ten site-specific projects at venues across Westminster, including Koo Jeong A, Alexandra Bachzetsis, Nina Beier, Linder, Joan Jonas & Jason Moran, Laure Prouvost, and Xu Zhen/MadeIn Company.

In 2018 Noble began working at Performa in New York, where she oversaw the program for the Performa Biennial 2019 and the Performa Biennial 2021 as Senior Curator and Head of Curatorial Affairs and curated elements of the Performa Biennial 2023. At Performa she has curated commissions by artists including Kia La Beija, Ericka Beckman, Kevin Beasley, Nikita Gale, Paul Pfeiffer, Tschabalala Self, Yvonne Rainer, and Bunny Rogers, alongside numerous other projects, events, and programs.

Writing and publications

Noble has published reviews and articles in Artforum, Frieze, ArtReview, Art Monthly, Mousse Magazine, Tate etc, Afterall and The Brooklyn Rail; and contributed essays to monographs on Geoffrey Farmer, Tala Madani, Éva Mag, Tschabalala Self, Mary Kelley Reid and Patrick Reid, Haegue Yang, and Yvonne Rainer.