Patricia Bentancur is an independent curator of contemporary art. She lives between Uruguay and France. Specializing in Ibero-American art, she was founder and former Director of Exhibitions and New Media at the CCE/MVD. Curator of the Uruguayan Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in three editions (2009-2015-2019) and co-curator of the MVD/El Gran Sur Biennale.. She has curated more than 200 exhibitions in different museums, cultural centres, and biennials across Europe and Latin America. Her vast career includes curating Global Myopia / Marco Maggi for the Venice Biennial of 2015 and Critical Landscapes / Bessio - Burgos – Uribe for the Venice Biennial of 2009, as well as co-curating the 1st International Biennial of Montevideo _ El Gran Sur (2012), and advising in the process of selecting and curating the representation of Uruguay in the Venice Biennale of Architecture of 2007 and 2016.
As a member of the Conceptualismos del Sur Network, Patricia directed the research on the work of Clemente Padin, curated the exhibition Clemente Padin: Texts, Documents and Films, and compiled the first book about his work. Among many other curatorial initiatives, are those with artists such as Felix Gonzalez Torres, Regina Silveira, Catarina Campino, Leon Ferrari, Ana Mendieta, Cildo Meirelles, Lenora do Barros, Allora and Calzadilla, Juan Manuel Echavarria, Priscilla Monge, Jorge Macchi, Eulalia Valldosera, Rogelio Lopez Cuenca, Valcarcel Medina, Tere Recarens, Jordi Colomer, Cao Guimarães, Vik Muniz, or Liliana Porter. She has also curated numerous monographic exhibitions, namely Problemática de género en América Latina (2005), Arte, deshonra y violencia (2007), La ética del paisaje / Yamandú Canosa (2008), Marco Maggi / Construcciones & demoliciones (2003), Luis Camnitzer / Lamentos del exilio (1990), and the itinerant exhibition Antoni Muntadas (1999-2000, Biennial of Havana).
Patricia has edited more than a hundred books on Ibero-American contemporary art and has published essays and texts in ARTE: (Uruguay), Nerter (Spain), Photography Quarterly (USA), Untitled (UK), among others. While developing her projects, she has worked in collaboration with colleagues, institutions and museums such as the Museo Reina Sofia, MOMA, Sammlung Goetz, Walker Art Center, Colección Rosa y Carlos de la Cruz, Fundación TEOR/éTica, Red de Conceptualismos del Sur, Banstrom & Stene, Colección Engelman_Ost, Instituto Tomie Ohtake, among many others.
She often collaborates with her counterparts and colleagues in the local and international development and dissemination of programs such as the Programa de Estudios Críticos y Curatoriales, the Programa de Investigación en Sonido y Performances, and the Centro de Recursos Audiovisuales. Her main areas of interest are currently focused on the parallel scope of the exhibitions, as ways of testing new work methodologies that involve and promote other forms of audience participation. She is also very interested in exploring different combinations of exhibitions, talks, pop ups, performances, projections and publications, with the aim of venturing into new territories of collaboration and cross-disciplinarity.
Patricia studied architecture at the Universidad de la República and the Escuela Superior de Arquitectura de Madrid, specializing in the design of spaces for contemporary art. She studied philosophy of art with Dr. Dorothee Bauer-Willert and Joan Van den Berge. She was also a researcher in the Academic Program / Fulbright (1996-2000): specialized in Architecture and Contemporary Art, during which she developed her research at the Guggenheim Museum and the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York. She holds a Master’s in Arts Management from the New York University. She is also Associate Artist of the Atlantic Center for the Arts / ACA-USA.