Dr Michael Asbury

Biography

Dr Michael Asbury is an Anglo-Brazilian art historian, curator and art critic. He is a founding member of the research centre for Transnational Art, Identity and Nation (TrAIN) at UAL and since 2012 has been its deputy director.

An internationally recognised scholar of modern and contemporary art from Brazil, he has published extensively and curated numerous exhibitions in the UK, Europe and Latin America.

Questioning consensual notions in art history that have withheld the so-called Western canon, his practice draws on post-colonial and decolonial methodologies whether through the critique of strictly aesthetic genealogies or the exploration of individual artistic trajectories. The transnational character of his work is constituted through the articulation of artistic and curatorial agency, institutional critique, and the inevitably porous nature of national cultural boundaries.

As a curator he has worked with institutions such as Tate Modern, Camden Arts Centre, Fundação Iberê Camargo, amongst others. His writing has been published internationally by institutions such as: Maxxi Museum of 21st Century Art, Rome; ICA, Miami; Modern Art Oxford; Whitechapel Gallery; Padiglione d'Arte Contemporea, Milan; Pinacoteca do Estado, São Paulo; Museu Oscar Niemeyer, Curitiba; Ella Fontanals-Cisneiros Collection, Miami; Schim Kunsthalle Frankfurt; Astrup Fearnley Musset, Oslo; Museum of Modern Art, Rio de Janeiro; Mead Gallery Warwick Arts Centre; Turner Contemporary, Margate; The Americas Society, New York; Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon; Documenta 12, Kassel; Henry Moore Institute, Leeds; Parasol-Unit, London; and Tate, London and Liverpool.

At UAL, Michael has championed international collaboration and exchange, fostering the establishment of the associate PhD student programme at UAL, while hosting numerous scholars and artists from overseas. He currently represents UAL within the Histories, Cultures and Futures strand of Shared Campus and is a member of the Latin America regional group. He has supervised 22 PhD students to completion at UAL and in partnership with international institutions, has acted as PhD examiner and coordinator of visiting scholars, artists and post-doc placements.