Ellen Lupton didn’t just curate design—she democratized it: ”Art exhibitions are an established genre, dominating the top of the cultural pyramid. Architecture exhibitions tend to be technical and scholarly because architectural history has a deep academic pedigree. Design is a younger field. There is more room for play in design exhibitions. The artifacts are less precious.”

Bart De Baere, director of Antwerp’s M HKA is rewriting what a museum can be:”I do not distinguish between biennials and other exhibitions. For me, any necessary exhibition creates a temporary genius loci - a temporary spirit of the place. A necessary exhibition is a singularity and it is never something that can be systemically repeated.”

When Songxian Jian moved to Japan to study design, he unexpectedly fell in love with pottery. Now based in China’s pottery capital Jingdezhen, his work combines his training in pottery from Japan with ancient Chinese techniques.

Marielsa Castro Vizcarra doesn’t just curate exhibitions—through her work at Museo Jumex in Mexico City and curatorial collective Coopia, she is reimagining space beyond colonial frameworks.

From transforming a local market into a communal hub (Museos en común) to questioning architecture’s hierarchies, Castro activates in her curatorial practice collective action.