Octavio Zaya
Born in the Canary Islands and based in New York since 1978, Octavio Zaya is an independent curator. Advisor of Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León, MUSAC (León, Spain) and co-director of Atlántica, a bilingual quarterly magazine published by CAAM, Canary Islands, he belongs to the editorial board for NKA Journal of Contemporary African Art (Cornell University, N.Y.) and Lab 71 (N.Y.), an electronic art magazine on the web, and is a US correspondent for Flash Art. He was one of the curators of Documenta 11 (2002), as part of the curatorial team under the direction of Okwui Enwezor, and one of the curators of the 1st and 2nd Johannesburg Biennial (1995 and 1997).
During 2005 Zaya presented several exhibitions: After the Revolution. Contemporary Artists from Iran -Koldo Mitxelena, San Sebastián, 2005 and Kunstforeningen, Copenhague, 2006-, Carmela García: the Hole in Space -CAAM, Las Palmas, and Centro Juan Ismael, Fuerteventura, 2005-, and Shirin Neshat: The last Word -MUSAC, 2005; CAAM, 2006-. He is currently working on an exhibition, bringing together several video works by Jesper Just and also on a survey of the video-installations of Candice Breitz. In addition, Octavio Zaya is organizing the 1st Biennial of Photography in Petach-Tikva, Israel.