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Curator Jenn Ellis on collaborating with Breguet for Frieze 2024
By Shivani Dubey | 25 September 2024 | Arts, Culture
Breguet celebrates the third year of its global partnership with Frieze Art Fair by collaborating with curator Jenn Ellis for its 2024 edition
Breguet has been the global partner of Frieze Art Fair since 2022, and this year will mark the luxury watch brand’s third year at the Frieze. To mark each year, Breguet gives carte blanche to an artist or curator to create bespoke exhibitions on the theme of time for their stand at the fair. For the 2024 edition, Breguet has partnered with London based curator Jenn Ellis.
Jenn is a curator with roots in Switzerland and Colombia, and is passionate about the considered meeting of art, space and context. Over the last decade, she has created meaningful projects and connections between artists, galleries, and institutions globally.
For Frieze London, Jenn is looking to explore evolutionary change through time, with the idea being that when change occurs, you know time has passed, while also exploring the nature of that change. And getting the chance to showcase at Frieze 2024 with Breguet is a moment that she doesn’t take lightly.
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“Showcasing at Frieze and partnering with Breguet is a huge moment curatorially but even more importantly is very meaningful in terms of what it can unlock for an artist,” says Jenn. “Following from my wider curatorial practice, I’ve chosen to focus on global artistic dialogue, thinking very carefully about the connections that could be drawn.”
And for the London edition of her exhibition, Jenn has chosen to spotlight the celebrated indigenous artist Naminapu Maymuru-White, who is based in Yirrkala in the Northern Territory, Australia.
“I first collaborated with Naminapu Maymuru-White in 2023 as part of a group exhibition exploring story and place. I love the way her work is a form of storytelling, expressing how the souls of her clan ancestors are seen through a river of stars, painting with clay on bark and occasionally board,” says Jenn.
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“She learnt how to paint through her father and is passing on her knowledge to her children; I found it very touching and relevant to Breguet — the ideas of passing on know-how, ancestry and custodianship,” she adds.
Naminapu’s piece at Frieze London will be a multi-bark panel piece entitled ‘River of Stars’. The piece follows from her recent large-scale presentation at the 2024 Venice Biennale. This is accompanied by a wrap-around installation that draws from her solo exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne.
“Naminapu’s work is an articulation of age-old stories and as such explores time through the lens of ancestral storytelling. It also reflects time as a passing of knowledge, tradition, learnt and taught creative making,” says Jenn.
Jenn’s collaboration with Naminapu and Breguet will be presented at Frieze London from 9 to 13 October at Regent’s Park, and Jenn hopes that it evokes a sense of collective humanity in anyone who visits the exhibition.
“I hope people feel the care of generations and a sense of collective humanity. There is a lot to learn from Naminapu’s universe; her relationship with the earth, the respect for our natural world and the care that’s taken in preserving stories so they may be passed onto future generations,” she adds.