4 December, UCA Canterbury
12 noon, Fine Art Department

Donna Lynas will be talking about Wysing as part of the Collaborative Research Group; a new internship and education programme that sees a collaboration between University of the Creative Arts (UCA) at Canterbury and CRATE, Margate. 

Donna Lynas has been Director of Wysing Arts Centre since 2005, before which she was Curator at South London Gallery for six years and where, alongside curating exhibitions, she established the gallery’s influential performance and off-site programmes. At SLG she worked with artists including Christian Boltanski, On Kawara, Joelle Tuerlinckx and Keith Tyson on their solo exhibitions and projects, alongside curating a number of group exhibitions.

Prior to that, Donna was Curator at Modern Art Oxford (MAO), where she worked with a number of artists, including Willie Doherty and Mona Hatoum, on their solo exhibitions. She also re-configured MAO exhibitions as part of a touring programme, working with Marina Abramovic, Louise Bourgeois, Douglas Gordon and Tony Oursler amongst many others.

Donna moved to Wysing in order to develop a new model of working, that placed the emphasis on thinking and making rather than exhibiting. It has been her aim to establish a productive environment in which artists can work and she has developed Wysing's identity as a research centre for the visual arts; introducing experimental artists' residencies and retreats, and commissioning and curating ambitious projects including the annual festival of art and music. 

Alongside residencies, Wysing operates artistic retreats, artists’ masterclasses and an annual summer school. In 2015 it will launch, the Syllabus, in partnership with Eastside Projects, New Contemporaries, Spike Island, Studio Voltaire and S1, a new programme that supports an annual cohort of ten artists across ten months.

Donna studied Design at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art, Dundee before moving into sculpture, working from studios in Dundee and Reading.