Alexandra Giniger, Gallerist
Hi, Alexandra! I’m so excited to speak with you and to have someone represented in this project from the art world! Can you share more on what you do?
I am the director of artist relations at Jack Shainman Gallery. I’ve been working in the art world for just under a decade. I studied art history, English, and French in undergrad at Georgetown University, and then I pursued my master’s degree directly after college. I studied art and museum studies at Georgetown and focused in contemporary art business at Sotheby’s in London. Both in Washington, D.C. and in London, it was incredible to have so many museums in which to study. The Smithsonian was a great resource, but ultimately I was interested in working with living artists, specifically artists of color, and so I returned to New York City for its rich gallery scene.
Between my junior and senior year of college, I interned at the Studio Museum in Harlem. All of my English studies in college had some focus on Black writers, but none of my art classes offered that exposure to Black artists. Maybe one or two were mentioned in an art history survey course, but there really wasn’t any contemporary Black art highlighted. So when I interned at the Studio Museum, which really is the nexus both for Black artists and arts administrators, that was so fulfilling.
I’m so appreciative of Thelma Golden, the long-time director and chief curator of The Studio Museum. She’s an incredible leader and an advocate for so many young Black people in this field. Wangechi Mutu, a Kenyan artist, who at the time was based in Brooklyn, gave me my first real job as her studio manager. She’s still a dear friend and mentor to me. She exposed me to so many different elements of the art world. It was beyond measure to work with her and to build her trust in me, allowing me to be a public voice of her creative vision. Through Wangechi, I met a lot of people I’ve since been able to collaborate with — museums, galleries, and artists across the globe.
After working in Wangechi’s studio for almost four years, I moved into the gallery world. I found that historically, galleries have been dominated by attention to white, male artists, so this was of course a huge shift. I would advocate for including Black artists in the gallery’s programming, but realized that in some ways, those artists were invisible to the people I was working with. It seemed like there were two parallel art worlds. I was trying to bring one into the other, which was critical to me — that all voices and practices be seen and heard. There’s so much talent out there that is just being ignored. Even though it was at times difficult to be doubted when trying to bring these voices to the table, it felt like there was almost no choice but to advocate for these underrepresented artists.
In March 2018, I started in my current position at Jack Shainman Gallery. It’s a gallery that I have been aware of for essentially my whole arts career and I’m so glad that I now work in this space. Jack has been one of the few gallerists who has given a platform to voices who are outside of the white male bubble that has been prioritized in the art world, and now Jack and we at the gallery work with some of the top Black artists of today. This is all incredibly meaningful to me and I’m beyond glad that I can have discussions surrounding social justice issues at work, as many of our artists engage with these topics in their practices.
What influences did you have growing up? Did you have any experiences that led you to the art world?
I grew up in New York City, where museums are part of the tapestry. They were part of my world growing up and what my mom exposed me to at a young age. She was always taking me to museums, particularly the Metropolitan Museum as I went to school nearby, and the ancient Egyptian wing was by far my favorite. I took photography and studio art classes growing up. I was always creatively inclined.
In high school, I took my first art history class and that, to me, was a way more interesting way to learn about the history of the world, politics, and culture than in a dryly written history textbook. It was so interesting to learn about spaces, places, and people through creative expression. I didn’t know in high school that this would be my career trajectory, but looking back it seems inevitable. In college, I took art history courses because of my experience in high school. I also participated in an internship at The Studio Museum, which is how I came to meet Thelma Golden and really have my eyes opened to this new, incredible space in which to explore my interest in contemporary Black artists and those historically viewed as outside of the mainstream.
It sounds as though you get to mix both the left and right sides of the brain — you’re doing creative work and business. Is that an accurate assessment?
That really is the crux of my job — having these curatorial conversations with artists we represent, then translating their visions into practical means. That could be communicating with museum curators, working on contracts, speaking with collectors who are acquiring the work to ensure they understand the artists’ motivations. I’m the liaison between the artists and the business side: everything it takes to make exhibitions come to fruition and to sustain our business, and the artists’ business, by placing the works with the best collectors. Through it all, my job is to ensure all those involved fully grasp the ins and outs of each artist’s practice.
Can you share more by what you mean when you say that you work with collectors around their understanding of the work? Why is that so important and what bearing does understanding have on the collector?
Sometimes it’s logistical, where we focus more on the conservation of the work, but oftentimes I feel passionately about making sure that the concept behind the work is not lost. For example, I work closely with Nick Cave, who is most known for his work called Soundsuits. This series is rooted in the experience of being a Black man in America. He made the first soundsuit sculpture after the Rodney King police beating, as a kind of coat of armor for protecting identity and to create fluidity while the wearer of said suit moves through the world. They are called Soundsuits because of how they sound when you wear them, but also for the “noise” that Black people are perceived to make while moving through society — we’re considered both loud while also rendered invisible. Soundsuits have gotten more and more elaborate and become more celebratory over the years, and so in that way it's very easy for collectors to forget what they’re actually about — it’s not solely this trendy piece. So, my job is to ensure that the message isn’t lost once the work is acquired, especially because a lot of artists are engaging in what can be seen as a tough dialogue. In terms of placing these works, it’s also our job to give these artists who have been underrepresented in museums as much opportunity as possible to be acquired by institutions into their permanent collections.
You mentioned Thelma Golden at The Studio Museum. Who are other people who have inspired you?
Black women who work in the art world are very supportive of one another, as there aren’t many of us. I even have some colleagues who I haven’t necessarily worked with directly, but I know they have my back. Wangechi is an artist I used to work with who is still a mentor and a sounding board. Isolde Brielmaier, who is Director of Public Art at Westfield World Trade Center, Curator at Large at the International Center of Photography, and teaches at New York University is another mentor. I’m also part of a collective called Entre Nous, which was started a few years ago by Courtney Willis Blair, a Director at Mitchell-Inness & Nash. We’re a group of Black women, all of whom work in gallery or commercial art world spaces, and we started meeting for casual dinners. A lot of us were friends beforehand, but it’s nice to have a slightly more formal setting to bounce ideas off of each other and just to hang out, knowing that we are all in similar positions professionally. Thelma Golden was actually our guest of honor at our last gathering!
Do you still create art?
I don’t practice art, myself, but I think about art all the time, even outside of work. Most of my friend group is in some creative sphere. You know about Entre Nous, but my girl gang also is made up of almost all people from creative spaces. Among us are Rujeko Hockley who is a curator at The Whitney Museum of American Art, and Naima Ramos-Chapman who is an incredible filmmaker. Sade Hooks is a director of marketing at an interior design firm and a jewelry maker for her own line, Sade.Gold, and Mbali Ndlovu is founder and lead designer of Lukafit, an empowering activewear brand designed with Black women’s curves in mind. So even though I’m not making art, even on weekends, I’m still in my creative Brooklyn bubble.
What are you excited about for your future?
Professionally, I’m excited to see that more and more every year, it seems, Black voices are being valued and gaining a recognition that is long overdue. You see it in that Martin Puryear and Mark Bradford represented America in the past two Venice Biennales, while Arthur Jaffa received the coveted Venice Biennale Golden Lion prize in 2019. Museums are intentionally beginning to integrate more Black voices into their exhibitions and permanent collections. It’s exciting to see and I hope it sustains. I also hope we continue to see more Black voices on the administrative side — curators, gallerists, art world workers. There really needs to be a two-sided dialogue.
Who are some of the Black woman artists that you’re excited about?
Some artists who come to mind are Torkwase Dyson, who has been working for some time, but is really starting to get more recognition, and also a younger, emerging Philly-based artist, Patricia Renee’ Thomas, who currently has a show on view at Kapp Kapp Gallery. My friend and mentor, Wangechi Mutu, is constantly pushing her practice forward. Her most recent large-scale commission was to create a series of massive bronze sculptures to grace the façade of the Metropolitan Museum of Art — the first time in the Met’s history that the façade has ever been altered. Then, of course, some of the powerhouse artists who I get to work with at Jack Shainman Gallery: Nina Chanel Abney, Toyin Ojih Odutola, Carrie Mae Weems, and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye.
Finally, what is your advice to young Black women seeking to get into the art world in some way?
The art world is viewed as insular and intimidating. Don’t be afraid to get out there and make connections in real life. Going to openings of artists I was interested in is how I met people in that community. For me, it happened organically and I was able to build that network early on in my career. We’ve all grown together and there is a lot of communal support for one another being, collectively, minorities in this space. So from the outside, the art world can be viewed as a hard-to-penetrate realm, but don’t be afraid to put yourself in the room and say hello.
Photo by Sophie Finkelstein
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