With many countries still hard at work choosing the artists they will bring to the 2011 Venice Biennale, the board that oversees the international event has announced that it has selected Bice Curiger to curate the high-profile, often controversial exhibition. Currently the curator of the Zurich Kunsthaus, a position she has held since 1993, Curiger is also editor-in-chief of Parkett magazine, the respected art journal she co-founded in 1984, and the publishing director of TATE ETC., a magazine published by Britain's Tate museum.

“I am very much looking forward to the great challenge,” Curiger stated of her appointment, in a statement. “This offers the opportunity to reflect on the highly communicative aspect of today’s art, which strongly engages and commits viewers – draughting a contemporary image of the individual in the broad collective and social context.” Biennale president Paolo Baratta praised the curator, saying that she "can boast great experience in research into contemporary art, in its criticism and exhibition, and has matured a profound knowledge and esteem of the world of artists.”

Previous curators of the Biennale include Daniel Birnbaum, who was responsible for the 2009 edition (and was just named director of Sweden’s Moderna Museet), Yale School of Art dean Robert Storr (who helmed the exhibition in 2007), and 2010 Whitney Biennial co-curator Francesco Bonami, who organized it in 2003.