Melanie Keen is Director of the Wellcome Collection and was previously Director of Iniva (the Institute of International Visual Arts) until 2019. Prior to joining Iniva in September 2015, Melanie was a senior relationship manager at Arts Council England. Previously, Melanie was an independent curator and consultant. Her curatorial projects include Figures of Speech for Film & Video Umbrella; Oscar Muñoz: Mirror Image for Iniva; A Better Place? with Erika Tan and Melissa Bliss for the Bow Festival: 48 Hours with Jacqueline Donachie, Mary Evans, Ella Gibbs, muf, Tomoko Takahashi and Jessica Voorsanger at the Tablet Gallery, London.
She was a curator at Iniva from 1997 to 2003 and projects include Soft: Artist as Curator, Janette Parris’ performance Mezzo Soprano?, Farah Bajull’s Untying the Knot, Yinka Shonibare’s Diary of a Victorian Dandy and Simon Tegala’s Anabiosis. She also curated Necessary Journeys, an Arts Council England / BFI collaboration which included: artists’ residencies with Jackie Kay, Keith Piper, and susan pui san lok; commissioning a live film score by Courtney Pine presented in the Tate Turbine Hall.
She has contributed to several publications including Changing States: A Unique Anthology of Essays and Artworks Celebrating 10 Years of inIVA as well as a monograph on Faisal Abdu’Allah. She also co-wrote and compiled Recordings: a selected bibliography of contemporary African, Afro-Caribbean and Asian British art with Elizabeth Ward.
Melanie is an Independent Advisor to the Government Art Collection, sits on the British Council’s Visual Arts Advisory Group and the Mayor of London’s Suffrage Commission Group. Most recently, she was on British Pavilion Selection Committee for the 58th Venice Biennale.