Performance Talks with Jenny Schlenzka

In this episode, I’m speaking with Jenny Schlenzka, Director of the Gropius Bau in Berlin.

We talk about Jenny’s early years in New York, her time at the Museum of Modern Art as its first performance curator, what it means to program live work and performance in museum structures not designed for sound and movement, and questions of collecting and historicizing dance and performance. We also talk about 02020, a project she concocted with Sarah Michelson during her time as Director of Performance Space New York in which they gave a group of artist the mandate to run the organization together, and how all this experience continues to shape how she thinks about the museum as a public space today.

Jenny Schlenzka is a Berlin-born curator with a strong fucus in contemporary art. She has been Director of Gropius Bau since September 2023. Prior to this appointment, Schlenzka spent more than 20 years in New York City, where she was Curator at The Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1 before becoming Executive Artistic Director at Performance Space New York (formerly PS 122) in 2017.

Follow Jenny:

https://www.instagram.com/jennyschlenzka

Stay tuned for more episodes!

Photo by Muriel Liebmann