Guest Editorial Contributor Aram Moshayedi is a curator at the nonprofit exhibition space LA><ART in Los Angeles and assistant curator for the 2008 California Biennial (CB08) at the Orange County Museum of Art. Moshayedi has published widely, with recent contributions appearing in Art Lies, Reading Room: A Journal of Art and Culture and Art Papers.
London-born, Los Angeles-based artist and writer Walead Beshty is an associate professor in the Graduate Fine Art Department at Art Center College of Design, Pasadena. He has had solo exhibitions at P.S. 1 in New York; UCLA/Hammer Museum in Los Angeles; and has upcoming solo exhibitions at LA><ART, Los Angeles; University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor; and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC. This past year, he was included in the 2008 Whitney Biennial, the 2008 California Biennial and will be featured in the 2009 Tate Triennial. Beshty is a regular contributor to Texte zur Kunst and Afterall. Reviews and articles on his work have appeared in Artforum, Frieze and The New Yorker. A monograph of his work is forthcoming from JRP/Ringier.
Liam Gillick is an artist based in London and New York. His solo exhibitions include The Wood Way, Whitechapel Gallery, London; A short text on the possibility of creating an economy of equivalence, Palais de Tokyo, Paris; and the retrospective project Three Perspectives and a short scenario, Witte de With, Rotterdam, Kunsthalle Zurich and MCA Chicago. In 2006, he cofounded the free art-school project unitednationsplaza in Berlin. Gillick has published a number of texts that function in parallel to his artwork, including Proxemics (Selected writing 1988–2006) [JRP|Ringier, 2007]. His monograph Factories in the Snow by Lilian Haberer (JRP|Ringier, 2007) will soon be joined by an extensive retrospective publication and critical reader. In addition, Gillick has contributed to many magazines and journals, including Parkett, Frieze, Art Monthly, October and Artforum.
Michael Ned Holte is a critic and curator based in Los Angeles. He is a frequent contributor to Artforum, and his writing has also appeared in Afterall, Domus, Frieze, Interview and North Drive Press. Earlier this year, Holte organized the exhibition Before & After Science at Richard Telles Fine Art in Los Angeles, and last month he was a member of the curatorial team for Present Future at Artissima 15 in Turin. Holte will join the California Institute of the Arts as a visiting faculty member in January 2009.
Shannon Jackson is Professor of Rhetoric and of Theater, Dance and Performance Studies at University of California, Berkeley. Her previous publications include articles on performance, politics and contemporary art for a variety of journals and collections. She is currently writing two books: one on performance and social practice and another on The Builders Association in collaboration with Marianne Weems.
Vishal Jugdeo is an interdisciplinary artist currently based in Los Angeles. He has exhibited widely in North America, including solo exhibitions at the Western Front and Helen Pitt Artist Run Centre, Vancouver, and at LA><ART, Los Angeles. Group exhibitions include the Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Los Angeles and Leslie Tonkonow Artworks + Projects, New York. Jugdeo recently taught studio art at the University of California Los Angeles and served as a regional bureau editor for the Fillip Review.
William Leavitt is an artist who works primarily with sound and narrative installation, often in a theatrical setting. Leavitt began exhibiting work in the early 1970s at Eugenia Butler Gallery, Los Angeles, followed by a series of installations and theater pieces including Spectral Analysis, which was first staged at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, in 1977.
Judy Radul is an artist living in Vancouver, BC. A consideration of forms and conditions of performance informs her practice, which includes video, installation, photography, live actions and audio works. In 2009, Radul’s video installation World Rehearsal Court will be presented as a solo exhibition at the Morris and Helen Belkin Gallery, University of British Columbia. Recent exhibitions include: MuHKA, Antwerp; Catriona Jeffries Gallery, Vancouver; Oboro, Montreal; Presentation House Gallery, North Vancouver; The Power Plant, Toronto. Radul currently teaches at Simon Fraser University.
David Román is Professor of English and American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California. Román’s research focuses on theatre and performance studies with an emphasis on contemporary American culture; American studies on race, sexuality and the performing arts; Latina/o studies with an emphasis on popular culture; and queer studies on archival practices, subcultural histories and artistic production.
In 2000, Alexandro Segade founded My Barbarian with Malik Gaines and Jade Gordon. The group has presented video, performance and music at venues including LACMA, REDCAT, UCLA/Hammer Museum, MOCA, LA><ART, LACE and Steve Turner Contemporary in Los Angeles; Whitney Museum of American Art, New Museum, P.S. 1, Studio Museum in Harlem, Participant, Inc., Anton Kern Gallery in New York; The Power Plant, Toronto; De Appel, Amsterdam; Museum Het Domein, Sittard, Netherlands; Peres Projects, Berlin; Torpedo, Oslo; El Matadero, Madrid; and Galleria Civica, Trento. In addition, My Barbarian was included in the 2005 and 2007 Performa Biennials, the 2006 and 2008 California Biennials and the 2007 Montreal Biennial.
Susan Silton is a Los Angeles-based artist whose work is supported through diverse media, including photographic-based processes, video, installation and offset lithography. Her work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally, including Feigen Contemporary, New York; SITE Santa Fe, New Mexico; Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne; New Orleans Contemporary Art Museum; UCLA/Hammer Museum; and Allianz Zweigniederlassung, Berlin.
Damon Willick is Assistant Professor of Modern and Contemporary Art History at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles and an editor of the journal X-TRA. He is currently co-curating an exhibition entitled Gallery 32 and Its Circle, which surveys the rich but largely overlooked history of one of Los Angeles’ most important venues for African American artists in the late 1960s.