2026 Oregon Contemporary Artists’ Biennial

Oregon Contemporary is pleased to announce TK Smith as the curator of the Artists’ Biennial 2026. Smith is a curator, writer, and cultural historian based in Atlanta, GA. He currently serves as Curator, Arts of Africa and the African Diaspora, at the Michael C. Carlos Museum at Emory University. Smith’s writing has been published in exhibition catalogues, academic journals, and periodicals, including Art Papers where he is a contributing editor. Smith is a doctoral candidate in the History of American Civilization program at the University of Delaware, where he studies the intersections of material culture, the built environment, and identity.

Oregon Contemporary Artists’ Biennial is a survey of works by visual and performing artists who are defining and advancing Oregon’s contemporary art landscape. The exhibition is supplemented by a series of interdisciplinary programming and events. Initially started by the Portland Art Museum as the Portland Biennial in 1949, Oregon Contemporary began the new iteration in 2010 and expanded to include artists residing Oregon-wide in 2016. The 2026 biennial will be the 8th iteration and the first to expand to include artists who were born in Oregon, educated in Oregon, or a previous resident of the state. Special considerations will be made for artists and performers who live in the Northwest region that participate or are in community with artists and institutions in Oregon.

Oregon Contemporary Artists’ Biennial 2026 will explore the interconnected themes of place, power, and promise, especially as they relate to our complex relationships with the land, our histories, and our nations. This exhibition intends to act as a response to the 250-year anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. This pivotal document emancipated the 13 American colonies from British rule, establishing the new nation with the promise of certain “unalienable rights” to all citizens. Since its signing, there have been long and violent battles to combat the restriction of those rights and the denial of full citizenship, often fought by the most vulnerable of us. The long history of Oregon offers us many examples of these battles occurring at various scales.

TK Smith is an Atlanta-based curator, writer, and cultural historian. Currently, Smith is Curator of the arts of Africa and the African Diaspora at Emory University’s Michael C. Carlos Museum. From 2022-2024, he served as Assistant Curator: Art of the African Diaspora at the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia. His independent curatorial projects include Hand to Mouth at Stove Works (2024), Kelly Taylor Mitchell & Sergio Suárez: Material Memory at Swan Coach House Gallery (2024), and Roland Ayers: Calligraphy of Dreams at the Woodmere Museum of Art (2021). Most recently, he completed a curatorial residency at Yinka Shonibare’s G.A.S. Residency in Lagos, Nigeria (2023). Smith’s writing has been published in several exhibition catalogues, academic journals, and periodicals. He has written for Art in America, the Brooklyn Rail, and ART PAPERS, where he is a contributing editor. In 2021, he was invited to be the inaugural writer-in-residence at the Vashon Artist Residency. In 2022, he was a recipient of an Andy Warhol Writers Grant for short form writing, and in 2024 he was a winner of the Leo and Dorothea Rabkin prize. As a public scholar, Smith has lectured for several institutions, including the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Saint Louis University, and Cornell University. Smith is a doctoral candidate in the History of American Civilization program at the University of Delaware. He received his Master of Arts in American Studies and his Bachelor of Arts in English and African American Studies, with a certificate in Creative Writing from Saint Louis University.