Courtesy Independent Curators International

Kate Fowle, the new executive director of Independent Curators International

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How are you planning to shake things up?

I'm keen to look at what a touring exhibition could be right now, and what the notion of independent curating internationally means today. It’s about independent thinking rather than the “institutional” versus “freelance” dichotomy, and touring may not always need to be moving objects and artworks from place to place. The movement of people and ideas is also important to think about.

So iCI would be an organization that would not only tour artworks but also, in a way, tour artists and curators — creative workers?

Yes. Dialogue, and the exchange of ideas, is incredibly vital in starting to develop networks nationally and internationally. With the increasing professionalization of the field, it’s about sharing resources and finding new ways of working that open up opportunities for artists and curators to connect with a wide range of audiences. I'm interested in thinking about touring as embracing the concept of a network, expanding the ways in which all facets of the art world, including collectors, commercial galleries, museums, nonprofits, and other people interested in the arts, can find out about and engage with what's happening all over the world. ICI could be a kind of hub.

ICI as a way of harnessing energy — less focused on conventional ideas about exhibitions.

Yes. That plays into what I've been thinking about for the last eight years or so, having co-founded the curatorial master’s program at California College of the Arts, which is: What constitutes curating an exhibition?

What shows would you point to as particularly exemplary of what iCI should be doing?

"High Times Hard Times," the New York painting show curated by Katy Siegel that toured two years ago, is a great example of a more historic show that profiled works that were being overlooked.

That show seemed to fit the ongoing curatorial interest in looking back and filling in historical blanks.

Yes, and I think another that did that was the "Jess: To and From the Printed Page" exhibition curated by Ingrid Schaffner. There is a lot of potential for iCI to do more solo shows. There have been very few, and they are of deceased artists.

Why?

ICI didn't want to prioritize one living artist over another. But in the current climate it's possible to reexamine that, potentially even working on a “project room” model with emerging artists rather than with large-scale exhibitions.

What challenges does a nonprofit like iCI face during the recession?

With many strong supporters of the arts, including foundations, feeling the impact of the recent crash, it’s not going to be easy in the coming year. This financial retraction isn’t just affecting museums and nonprofits but commercial galleries, too. That's just another instance of how interrelated the art world is now and why we need to think about new models of working together. There's a lot of scaling back, and the positive aspect of that is it enables people to rethink the key focus of their organization.

But how do you scale back?

Ultimately, you have to look at the way artists are working and what they need, while also looking at what your audience is interested in and what they need. There's less room now for getting those things wrong. Even if organizations end up downsizing, ideas don't have to get downsized. It's just about figuring out how to do them.

Sarah Douglas is Senior Correspondent for ARTINFO, Art+Auction, and Modern Painters.