Pooja Sood is an Indian curator and art management consultant. She is also the founding member and Director of KHOJ International Artist's Association.[1]

Pooja Sood, 2012

Education edit

Pooja is a mathematics graduate and has an MBA in Marketing (1984–86) from the Symbiosis Institute of Business Management, Pune. Sood has an MA in Art History (1990–92) from Punjab University, Chandigarh.[2][3] She also has a certificate in Cultural Policy from the CEU, Budapest (2007); and in Arts Management from the European Summer Academy of ICCM, Salzburg (2000).[4]

Career edit

Pooja started her career with Delhi-based Eicher Gallery in 1994 where she was the curator and administrator till 1998.[5] During her time with them she curated over 20 exhibitions. In 1997, Sood along with Bharti Kher, Subodh Gupta, Manisha Parekh, Anita Dube and Prithpal S. Ladi founded Khoj International Artists’ Association.[6][7] From 1998 - 2007, she coordinated the KHOJ International artist's workshops in Delhi (1998-2001), Bangalore (2002 -2003), Mumbai (2005), Kolkata (2006) and Srinagar (2007). From 2000 to 2010, she was the Regional Coordinator of the Triangle Arts Trust, UK where she researched and facilitated the establishment of independent not for profit visual art organizations in Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal called SANA (South Asian Network for the Arts).[8] She was the Curator of the Apeejay Media Gallery from 2002 to 2007. From October 2007- December 2008, she was also the Director of Artists Pension Trust, Mumbai.[9] She was appointed as the artistic director and curator of 48 °C Public.Art.Ecology, a public art project, commissioned by the Goethe Institut in December 2008.[4]

Since 2009, she has been serving as the Director of ARThinkSouthAsia (ATSA), an arts management programme for young managers in the cultural sphere.[10][11] From November 2015 to February 2019; Sood also served as the Director General of Jawahar Kala Kendra, an arts centre in Jaipur established by the Rajasthan Government.[12][13] Sood has been on several international juries, like the IAPA award of the Institute of Public Art, Shanghai (2014), the Asia Pacific Breweries Signature prize hosted by the Singapore Art Museum (2014–15) and the Korean Art prize, Seoul (2013).[4]

Sood is currently working on curating the Pune Biennale which is to be held in November–December 2019.[14][15]

Achievements edit

Sood was the recipient of a Junior Fellowship from the Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry, Government of India and developed a Directory of Funding for the Arts in 1998.[4] She is also a Chevening scholar on the Clore Leadership Programme, UK (2009-2011).[13]

Publications edit

She is the editor of The Khoj Book Of Contemporary Indian Art: 1997- 2007, published by HarperCollins, 2010.[16]

References edit

  1. ^ "Advisory Group". Sher-Gil Sundaram Arts Foundation. Retrieved 8 March 2019.
  2. ^ Chinki Sinha (March 30, 2018). "In search of fine art". India Today.
  3. ^ "Pooja Sood On Her Decades-Long Tryst With The Arts". Verve Magazine. July 28, 2017.
  4. ^ a b c d "PEOPLE AT KHOJ « KHOJ".
  5. ^ "In her Khoj". DNA India. February 25, 2018.
  6. ^ Maddox, Georgina (May 13, 2017). "Questing the alternative". The Hindu – via www.thehindu.com.
  7. ^ Ratnam, Chanpreet Khurana,Dhamini (February 26, 2016). "The art insiders". livemint.com.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  8. ^ "Advisor". www.punebiennale.in.
  9. ^ "Shaun Leonardo". Shaun Leonardo.
  10. ^ "ATSA Team | ARThinkSouthAsia".
  11. ^ https://en.unesco.org/creativity/sites/creativity/files/report_policy_consultation_creative_industries_goa.pdf[bare URL PDF]
  12. ^ "Pooja Sood steps down as Director General from Jawahar Kala Kendra". Mumbai Mirror.
  13. ^ a b "Sher-Gil Sundaram Arts Foundation | Advisory Group".
  14. ^ Kuruvilla, Elizabeth (March 7, 2019). "Where's the space?". The Hindu – via www.thehindu.com.
  15. ^ "Khoj to curate Pune Biennale". Pune Mirror.
  16. ^ Pooja Sood (2010). The Khoj Book Of Contemporary Indian Art: 1997-2007. Harpercollins. ISBN 978-8172236878. Retrieved 8 March 2019.