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Organisation Profile
Visual Artists’ News Sheet | January – February 2022
Amanda Coogan,Yellow, 2008, IMMA Collection (Purchase, 2021), installation view, ‘The Narrow Gate of the Here-and-Now, Chapter One: Queer Embodiment’; Photograph by Ros Kavanagh, courtesy the artist and IMMA.
Kate Antosik-Parsons: I was hoping we might be able to talk about IMMA’s mission to connect with audiences, and to provide a space in Ireland for contemporary life and contemporary art to come together. Could you tell me about that, and how it feeds into IMMA’s 30-year anniversary?
The Global Contemporary KATE ANTOSIK-PARSONS INTERVIEWS ANNIE FLETCHER ABOUT IMMA’S 30TH ANNIVERSARY PROGRAMME.
Annie Fletcher: For me it has been extremely interesting to come back to Ireland and take on the mission of being the director of this museum, understanding that actually, IMMA always did that. There was something urgent and resonant about the radical mission of IMMA from its inception in 1991, in relation to placing artists at the centre of the museum. Right from its beginnings, IMMA did this in relation to the artists’ work programme and how it privileged engagement and learning as equally valid and well-budgeted as any exhibition programme. All of that led me to have a sense that IMMA was truly one of those very contemporary sorts of museums, one that understood that it should be not only civic, but also a catalyst for thought. There was fantastic progression in the 1990s around art being this space to reflect, what it means, and how to connect both globally and locally. IMMA has always pioneered that sense of resonance and presence. That is unusual for a museum, because museums collect, of course, and privilege the archive. I think we are now understanding more and more, especially when archives are cut off from us, just how urgent and deeply political that notion of enunciating our own history is. I suppose all those things lead me to think that museums are full of potential to be connected to everyday life. KAP: In this moment that we’re living in, amidst the pandemic, being able to connect, and sometimes maybe not connect, is so present right now in our everyday lives. This strikes me as important from an institutional perspective, in being able to connect with audiences. How can