Cameroon: Koyo Kouoh, an exhibition curator committed to promoting African art

Exhibition/museum curator and cultural producer, Koyo Kouoh is an influential actor in the field of African art. The Cameroonian founded Raw Material Company in 2008 and has organized several art exhibitions in Africa and around the world. In 2015, the New York Times named her one of Africa’s most important curators.

Koyo Kouoh is an influential figure who has helped promoting African art on the international scene. Passionate about art and culture, she left behind her training and her job in the banking sector to devote herself to art. Whether as a curator or cultural producer, she has distinguished herself in the artistic and cultural sector in Africa and around the world. Since 2019, she has been Executive Director and Chief Curator of one of the largest museums in Africa, including the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art (Zeitz MOCAA) in South Africa.

Born in Cameroon, Koyo grew up in Switzerland, a country where she immigrated with her parents at the end of the 1970s. After studying economics in Switzerland, she briefly worked in the banking sector before embarking on culture, first in literature, then in exhibitions. She spent her entire career there, devoting herself to promoting and making visible African art in exhibitions and museums in Europe…

A popular exhibition curator

As a curator, she organized several art exhibitions in Europe, in Africa, and in Asia, becoming a very influential figure in the field. She curated 1:54 Forum, an educational program of the London Contemporary African Art Fair in New York. She was also curator of “Still the Barbarians” at the 37th edition of Eva International, Biennial of Ireland in Limerick in 2016. She also co-curated “Saving Bruce Lee: Arab and African cinema in the era of Soviet Diplomacy” at the Haus der Kulturen in Berlin, Germany. In addition, in 2018, she participated in the 57th edition of Carnegie International, with “Dig where you stand” at the Carnegie Museum of Art. As a curator, she is sensitive to gender issues and to the feminist point of view. She also acts as an advisor and member of juries at the international level, among others during the Swiss Salon at the Venice Biennale (2017).

In 2008, she founded the Raw Material Company in Senegal, a center for art, knowledge, and society. An initiative around exhibition curating, artistic education, knowledge production, art criticism…The center works to promote the growth and appreciation of artistic and intellectual creativity in Africa.

She is also the author of several books, including Raw Académie: A matter of knowledge (2020); “Word? Word? Word! Issa Samb and “The undecipherable form” (2013); “Condition: Symposium Report on Building Art Institutions in Africa” (2012).

In 2020, she received the Grand Prix Suisse d’Art/Prix Meret Oppenheim, which honors personalities in art, architecture, conservation, and research who contribute to contemporary art and architecture in Switzerland.