Tina Rivers Ryan

Tina Rivers Ryan is an American curator, researcher, author, editor, and art historian.^[2] Her expertise is in new media art,^[3][4] which includes digital art,^[5] and internet art.^[6] She is a curator at the Albright–Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, New York since 2017.^[3][7][8][9] In 2024, Ryan was named the editor-in-chief of Artforum magazine.^[10]

Tina Rivers Ryan
Born	Tina Rivers^[1]
Nationality	American
Education	Harvard University, Columbia University
Occupation(s)	curator, researcher, art historian, author, editor
Employer(s)	Artforum (2024–present), Albright–Knox Art Gallery (2017–present)
Known for	New media art scholar
Website	www.tinariversryan.com

Early life and education

Tina Rivers Ryan attended Gulliver Preparatory School in Miami for high school.^[1] She has a BA degree from Harvard University,^[1] and a PhD from Columbia University. Her dissertation was, 'Lights in Orbit': The Howard Wise Gallery and the Rise of Media in the 1960s (2014), her doctoral advisor was Branden W. Joseph.^[11] She worked as a fellow at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.^[1]

Career

In 2017, Ryan was hired as an assistant curator at Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, New York; and by 2022, she was promoted to curator.^[12][13][9] Prior to her appointment she previously worked at the New Museum, MoMA PS1, and the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston.^[12] Ryan has researched "time-based media" of the 1960s and 1970s.^[14] She has also been involved in the study and research of digital art preservation, including NFTs.^{[14][15][16][17]}

Ryan and co-curator Paul Vanouse [Wikidata] organized the 2021 exhibition Difference Machines: Technology and Identity in Contemporary Art at the gallery.^[18][19] The Difference Machines exhibition features 17 artists and has a hybrid display design featuring interactivity, the artwork is technical but also accessible to people without technical knowledge, and it exists as a learning space.^[20][21] A review in The Brooklyn Rail discussed the exhibition's themes of "the use of digital technologies for passive (but not always effective) surveillance, how identities are shaped by technology, the erasure of marginalized communities, and the active reassertion of control."^[22]

Other exhibitions at Albright-Knox she has co-curated include Tony Conrad: A Retrospective (2018), and We The People: New Art from the Collection (2018–2019).^[23]

In March 2024, Ryan was named the editor-in-chief of Artforum magazine, succeeding David Velasco.^[10][24][25]

Publications

• Ryan, Tina Rivers (2016). McLuhan's Bulbs: Light Art and the Dawn of New Media. Columbia University.

Co-authored or contributed

• Schmaltz, Tad M. (2014). "Reflection: Efficient Causation in Art". Efficient Causation: A History. Tina Rivers Ryan (contributor). Oxford University Press. pp. 311–316. ISBN 9780199782178.
• Baum, Kelly; Bradnock, Lucy; Ryan, Tina Rivers (September 12, 2017). Delirious: Art at the Limits of Reason 1950–1980. New York, NY: Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN 978-1588396334.^[26]

Exhibition-related

• Blauvelt, Andrew; Castillo, Greg; Choi, Esther; Clarke, Alison (2015). "Toward a Stroboscopic History". Hippie Modernism: The Struggle for Utopia (art exhibition). Tina Rivers Ryan (contributor). Walker Art Center. p. 380. ISBN 9781935963097.
• Chaffee, Cathleen, ed. (2018). Introducing Tony Conrad: A Retrospective (art exhibition). Rachel Adams (author), Diedrich Diederichsen (author), Branden Wayne Joseph (author), David Grubbs (author), Jay Sanders (author), Constance DeJong (author), Vera Alemani (author), Tina Rivers Ryan (author), Annie Ochmanek (author), Andrew Lampert (author), Christopher Müller (author), Tony Oursler (contributor), Anthony Elms (author), Henriette Huldisch (author), Paige Sarlin (author), Christopher Williams (author). Albright-Knox Art Gallery. ISBN 9783960983361.
• Tenconi, Roberta; Ryan, Tina Rivers (2020). Matt Mullican: Photographs: Catalogue 1971–2018 (art exhibition). James Welling (photographer), Matt Mullican (artist), Anne Rorimer (contributor), Marie-Luise Angerer (contributor). Milan, Italy: Skira and Hangar Bicocca. ISBN 978-8857241173.
• Goodeve, Thyrza Nichols; Ryan, Tina Rivers (January 12, 2021). Art, Engagement, Economy: the Working Practice of Caroline Woolard (art exhibition). Patricia C. Phillips (foreword), D. Burnett (contributor), Alison Burstein (contributor), Stamatina Gregory (contributor), Larissa Harris (contributor), Leigh Claire La Berge (contributor), Stephanie Owens (contributor), Cybele Maylone (contributor), Steven Matijcio (contributor), Sheetal Prajapati (contributor), Caitlin Julia Rubin (contributor), Mierle Ukeles (contributor). Eindhoven, Netherlands: Onomatopee Projects. ISBN 978-9493148345.

See also

• Conservation and restoration of time-based media art
• Digital curation
• Women in the art history field

References

1. "Weddings: Christopher Ryan and Tina Rivers". Daily Freeman. 2014-06-15. Retrieved 2022-01-02.
2. Small, Zachary (2022-12-22). "The Innovators: Curator Tina Rivers Ryan on Getting Over Her NFT Skepticism and What's Next for Blockchain Art". Artnet News. Retrieved 2023-02-25.
3. Greenberger, Alex (2021-04-07). "Gene Youngblood, Writer of Influential 'Expanded Cinema' Book, Has Died at 78". ARTnews.com. Retrieved 2022-01-02.
4. "Nie żyje Gene Youngblood, miał 78 lat". ksiazki.wp.pl (in Polish). 2021-04-08. Retrieved 2022-01-26.
5. "Why many art collectors are staying away from the NFT gold rush". The Independent. 2021-04-30. Archived from the original on 2022-06-21. Retrieved 2022-01-02.
6. Westreich, Ava; Moussazadeh, Audrey (May 7, 2021). "Art curator discusses NFTs with students". The Horace Mann Record. Retrieved 2022-01-03.
7. Galer, Sophia Smith. "How to create an iconic image". bbc.com. Retrieved 2022-01-02.
8. "Exhibit explores bias encoded in tech". University at Buffalo. October 14, 2021. Retrieved 2022-01-02.
9. "Buffalo AKG Art Museum Announces Promotion of Dr. Tina Rivers Ryan to Curator". Buffalo AKG Art Museum. October 18, 2022. Retrieved 2024-01-12.
10. "Artforum Selects Tina Rivers Ryan as New Top Editor". The New York Times. 2024-03-14. Retrieved 2024-03-15.
11. "Twentieth Century Art Dissertations in Progress by Subject, 2014". CAA Reviews. Retrieved 2022-01-03.
12. "Tina Rivers Ryan Appointed Assistant Curator at Albright-Knox Art Gallery". Artforum.com. May 9, 2017. Retrieved 2022-01-02.
13. Small, Zachary (2021-04-28). "As Auctioneers and Artists Rush Into NFTs, Many Collectors Stay Away". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2022-01-02.
14. Dunlavy, Adam (2016-12-09). "Topics in Time-Based Media Art Conservation: Tina Rivers Ryan". VoCA | Voices in Contemporary Art. Bobst Library at New York University. Retrieved 2022-01-06.
15. Lu, Fei (2022-01-06). "Does NFT Art Have A Place In The Museum In 2022?". Jing Culture and Commerce. Retrieved 2022-01-06.
16. Lawson-Tancred, Jo (2021-06-29). "Tim Berners-Lee said the world wide web was for everyone, so why has he sold its source code as an NFT?". Apollo Magazine. Retrieved 2022-01-26.
17. Valeonti, Foteini; Bikakis, Antonis; Terras, Melissa; Speed, Chris; Hudson-Smith, Andrew; Chalkias, Konstantinos (January 2021). "Crypto Collectibles, Museum Funding and OpenGLAM: Challenges, Opportunities and the Potential of Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)". Applied Sciences. 11 (21): 9931. doi:10.3390/app11219931.
18. Moran, Jay (2021-12-17). "Albright-Knox Northland exhibition questions technology's influence on the modern world". WBFO. NPR, Western New York Public Broadcasting Association. Retrieved 2022-01-02.
19. Eppley, Charles (January 4, 2022). "Difference Machines". Rhizome. Retrieved 2022-01-26.
20. Hall, Lauren (December 28, 2021). "'Difference Machines' exhibit examines the intersection of art and technology". WGRZ. WGRZ-TV. Retrieved 2022-01-03.
21. "Albright-Knox exhibit highlights technology and identity through art". The Spectrum. Retrieved 2022-01-03.
22. Kent, Charlotte (2021-12-08). "Difference Machines: Technology and Identity in Contemporary Art". The Brooklyn Rail. Retrieved 2022-01-02.
23. Reynolds, Emily Ebba. "Tina Rivers Ryan on falling in love with Art History, Navigating Audiences, and Motherhood in the Art World". Cornelia Magazine. Retrieved 2022-01-03.
24. "Tina Rivers Ryan to Lead 'Artforum' as New Editor in Chief". Vogue. Condé Nast. 2024-03-14. Retrieved 2024-03-15.
25. Boucher, Brian (2024-03-14). "Tina Rivers Ryan Named Editor of Artforum Magazine". Artnet News. Retrieved 2024-03-15.
26. "Nonfiction Book Review: Delirious: Art at the Limits of Reason, 1950–1980 by Kelly Baum, Lucy Bradnock, and Tina Rivers Ryan". PublishersWeekly.com. Retrieved 2022-01-26.