Cécile Bourne-Farrel is Curator of Visual Materials on the project, 'Mapping Injury'. The Principal Investigator of the project is Professor Vivienne Jabri and it is funded by a UKRI Frontier Research Grant (Horizon Europe Guarantee), King's College London.

She has worked for the A R C / Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris for eight years and with institutions of higher education in Africa, Asia and Europe, including King’s College London since 2015. In 2019, she joined Arts Cabinet on an advisory capacity and as Curator for ‘Sugar and its colonial legacy’ and Shivanjani Lal. Her projects focus on decolonial practices based on a curatorial ethos between artists, institutional and private infrastructures.

Recent projects 

’The Score (You and I Both Know) by Corinne Silva’, The Arcades, Bush House, The Strand, co-curator with Vivienne Jabri Professor of International Politics, Department of War Studies, King's College London, 7 February to 4 March 2023. 

'Seas, Lands and Bodies Crossed’, 28 April to 21 May at La Traverse, Marseille with Malala Andrialavidrazana, Francis Alÿs, Shivanjani Lal, Louisa Marajo, Tuli Mekondjo, Otobong Nkanga and Jean-Paul Thibeau. 

'Antson’ ny tontolo miaina/Interpeller le vivant', Antananarivo, Madagascar, 20 May to 5 June, a collaboration with Ihoby Rabarijohn, co-curator. 

A Dobradiça Biennale, Mação, Portugal, 6 July to 11 August 2023

Cécile studied art history and is an active member of AICA, Association of Women in the Arts (AWITA) and the International Committee for Museums and Collections of Modern Art (CIMAM). She advocates and writes regularly for contemporary artists (Pilar Albarracín, Iván Argote, Baptist Coelho, Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige, Chourouk Hriech, Mikhail Karikis, Michèle Magema, Tuli Makondjo, Otobong Nkanga, Jem Perucchini, Corinne Silva, James Webb, etc). 

Visit Cécile's website to find out more about her work: https://www.cecile-bourne-farrell.com

Research interests:

• Research based projects
• Contemporary art, trauma and violence against women
• Invisible injury

Through the project 'Mapping Injury', Cécile has explored bringing visible what is invisible through research-based projects that involve contemporary art and artists. Her curatorial work consists of identifying and profiling international artists that will potentially be able to articulate and deliver convincing artistic propositions according to the proposed themes and concepts decided by Professor Vivienne Jabri. A wide range of media will be used and developed for different audiences, according to the different geographies and audiences that are being addressed through 'Mapping Injury'.

Recent publications and participations (selection):

• Interview with Shivanjani Lal for Arts Cabinet, Migration, December 2024
• ‘Once There Was and Once There Wasn’t', an interview with Corinne Silva about her site-specific project for Adobradiça Biennial, Mação, Portugal
• Interview with Elisa Elisa Moris Val, ‘Bittersweet France’, October 2024
• ‘Jem Perucchini, peintre de tous les potentiels’, Prix Jean-François Prat, Paris, April 2023
• Baptist Coelho, ‘Attempts at resilience and empathy’, Flanders Fields Museum, Leper, Belgium 2023
• ‘Retourner le gant de l’Histoire’, ‘Europa Oxalá’; Mucen, Marseille and Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon and Musée Royal d’Afrique Centrale, Tervuren, Coimbra University, Portugal, (2021/2022)
• ‘Another connection to colonial time’, Belas Artes, Lisbon (Convocarte, n°8 p. 91-106)
• ‘Yapci Ramos, ’Nothing is true, everything is living’, Caac Las Palmas and Casa Africa, Gran Canarias, 2019
• ‘Interview with Soufiane Ababri’, in Some Things We Africans Got, #6
• War for Presence: Conflict and Identity at the Art-IR Nexus, June 2018, King’s College London
• ‘Near and Far: Desynchronised Perspectives of Our Contemporary History’, Frac NormandieCaen, 2002/2014, Editions Dilecta, 2018; Isbn: 978 2373 720518
• ‘Art Public in Africa, Art et Transformations urbaines à Douala’, Metis Press, 2017
• Traces of War, 2017, King’s College London
• Hrair Sarkissian, Armenian Pavillon, Venice, 2015 (http://www.armenity.net/)
• Interview with Jananne Al-Ani, n°59 Multitudes

Teaching

Cécile has taught on the following courses:

• Intervention for MA Culture, Criticism and Curation, Central Saint Martins, London (2020)
• MA Paris School of Art (2012-2020)

Memberships 

• AICA
• Association of Women in the Arts (AWITA)
• International Committee for Museums and Collections of Modern Art (CIMAM)
• British Library