Tim Griffin is leaving The Kitchen after nearly a decade as the director and chief curator of the experimental New York art space. During his tenure, Griffin continued and expanded the storied institution’s focus on interdisciplinarity and oversaw a program featuring Chantal Akerman, ANOHNI, Charles Atlas, Gretchen Bender, Abraham Cruzvillegas, Ralph Lemon, Aki Sasamoto, and Tyshawn Sorey, among others. His term also led to new initiatives including the hybrid talks series “The Kitchen L.A.B.” and electronic music series “Synth Nights.” Griffin—who began helming the nonprofit in 2011 after a seven-year run as the editor-in-chief of Artforum, where he is currently a contributing editor—will shift into an advisory role at The Kitchen by year’s end; he has accepted a visiting professorship in the art history and English departments at Ohio State University in Columbus, where his wife, Johanna Burton, directs The Wexner Center for the Arts.  

“I can’t imagine a more inspiring or humbling experience among artists than what The Kitchen, and its dedicated staff and board, has offered me over the years,” said Griffin. “Few places have such a history, decade after decade, of presenting the unexpected. Even fewer have people so deeply committed every day to supporting artists’ innovative work, and who, time and again, manage to pull it off whatever the challenges.”

In addition to organizing exhibitions and performances, Griffin has spent the last two years fundraising in anticipation of The Kitchen’s fiftieth anniversary in 2021 and the renovation of its building at West Nineteenth Street in Chelsea. The organization has raised $11 million ahead of its special benefit show, “Ice and Fire,” curated by Kitchen board members Wade Guyton and Jacqueline Humphries opening with online viewing October 8. In the last few months, the venue has also adapted to pandemic-induced lockdown, introducing The Kitchen Broadcast and revising its residencies to include a TV studio model. A search for a new director is being conducted by Isaacson Miller.