Liverpool Biennial Taps Marie-Anne McQuay to Curate 2025 Edition

The Liverpool Biennial, the UK’s premier contemporary art event, has selected Marie-Anne McQuay as the curator for the 2025 biennial’s thirteenth edition, scheduled to take place from early June to September.

McQuay succeeds Khanyisile Mbongwa, a Cape Town-based sociologist who led the 2023 edition under the theme “The Sacred Return of Lost Things”. During that showcase, artists interrogated Liverpool’s colonial connections and idea of objects reclaiming historical ties that were once severed.

In a statement, McQuay conveyed eagerness to engage in “reflecting on civic life” as part of the curatorial prompt for the exhibition, which has not yet been officially disclosed. Dr. Samantha Lackey, the director of Liverpool Biennial, highlighted McQuay’s ties to the English city as a resident, stating that the event’s organizers expect her appointment will bring “insight and intention” to the biannual exhibition, which has been running since 1998.

Lackey added that alongside selecting McQuay for the role, the organizers are contemplating “re-thinking the city’s changing relationships to the rest of the world.”

McQuay, currently the director of projects at the UK agency Arts&Heritage, has a decade-long history of organizing exhibitions for contemporary artists. As the former program director at Bluecoat, Liverpool, she managed shows featuring artists such as Adham Faramawy, Jade Montserrat, Larissa Sansour, and Rosa-Johan Uddoh.

In 2019, she guest curated the Welsh pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale and worked as a curator at Spike Island in Bristol from 2007 to 2013, collaborating with artists such as Haroon Mirza, Elizabeth Price, Laure Prouvost, and Sonia Boyce.