Cultural Advisor, Curator, Writer
Art, culture, and living a creative, considered life.
Over the past twenty years, I have worked across cultural, political, and institutional life, helping leaders and organizations think through what they want to say, what they want to build, and how to bring others into the conversation.
Today, my work as a writer, consultant, and curator brings that experience into conversation with my own questions about purpose, meaning, and responsibility. Why do we do the work we do? Who does it serve? What do we want it to contribute? These questions inform both the counsel I offer others and the creative work I develop myself.
I’m interested in how art and culture shape our understanding of the world, connect us to one another, and help us recognize our place in a larger human story. I’m also interested in the standards we develop for ourselves, the places and communities we serve, and how we build lives and institutions that reflect what we actually value.
Learn more about my work.
I work with cultural leaders, artists, and institutions to develop ideas, shape exhibitions and public programs, and think through how their work connects with the people they want to reach. I am interested in partnerships that bring together intellectual rigor, creative curiosity, and a shared commitment to cultural and public life.
My experience includes corporate and digital communications in finance, communications leadership for the Congressional Black Caucus and Congressman Adam Smith, public engagement at the New York Public Library and Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and arts communications at Sutton. Through my own practice at ElevenThirtySix, I have worked with more than thirty cultural organizations including The Africa Center, the International Center of Photography, the International Studio and Curatorial Program, and Socrates Sculpture Park.
I hold a BA in Journalism and Mass Communication from UNC Chapel Hill, an MA in Strategic Communications from American University, and a Master of Liberal Arts in Museum Studies from Harvard Extension School, with executive education from Duke University and Sotheby’s Institute of Art.
Essays on arts, culture, and living a considered, creative life.
Perspective
Two years ago, I wrote about the struggle between democracy and autocracy. The closing of the Kennedy Center shows why culture was always going to be one of its most consequential battlegrounds.
What happens when even our most prominent institutions can no longer hold the line?
Read the essay ↗Reading Notes, No. 1
On the courage of your mistakes, and the question I am sitting with this season.
Read the essay ↗From the archive
On going quiet, the end of the information age, and the one thing no machine can do in your place.
Read the essay ↗From the archive
What ten days in India taught me about surrender, instinct, and the life that’s already yours.
Read the essay ↗Strategic advisory, exhibitions, and gatherings with individuals and institutions shaping culture and creative life.
Cultural strategy & advisory
Cultural strategy and advisory for individuals and institutions.
Through focused strategy engagements and six-month advisory relationships, work with cultural leaders who make consequential decisions about exhibitions, cultural programs, public narratives, audiences, and the work they are bringing into the world.
Explore advisory engagements ↗An art house · Dakar
A contemporary art house rooted in Dakar and open to the world.
Through exhibitions, conversations, and gatherings, Galerie36 presents African and diasporic artists and creates space to spend time with their work and with one another. A place where artists feel supported and people can build a deeper relationship with their own creative practice.
Explore Galerie36 ↗
For conversations and considered collaborations, you can reach me directly.
ak@ayofemikirby.comFor cultural strategy and institutional advisory, explore ElevenThirtySix.
Reading notes, essays, and the questions I’m sitting with. I’m happy to share them with you.
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