Amanda Coulson, former director of the National Art Gallery of the Bahamas, has been named founding director of the new TERN Gallery in Nassau, Bahamas. Eyewitness News reports:

TERN Gallery, a new gallery in Nassau aiming to bring Bahamian and Caribbean art to the international stage, has officially opened, with longtime National Art Gallery of The Bahamas (NAGB) executive Amanda Coulson being named its founding director.

TERN opened on December 7, 2020 with an exhibition curated by Jodi Minnis entitled “Inherited Values”, featuring work by Kendra Frorup and Anina Major. The exhibition will run until February 8, 2021.

A statement announcing the gallery’s opening said the “synergy between local specificity and worldly appeal” is embodied by the gallery’s name, which refers to a species of beach bird that is native to The Bahamas but migrates worldwide.

The inaugural exhibition, “Inherited Values”, centers on two Bahamian artists whose practices draw on memory and cultural tradition to conjure a contemporary vision of economic possibility and ecological sustainability. Looking to the straw industry and Mortimer’s Candy Kitchen — a Nassau landmark beloved for its confections and community impact alike — Frorup and Major propose a space of potential where local commerce, creatively framed, can guide the way towards a prosperous future for island nations’ micro-economies.

“The urgency of envisaging flourishing Caribbean futures has been highlighted as the COVID-19 pandemic unearthed global structural inequalities the world over, further emphasizing the timeliness of Major and Frorup’s work,” the statement read. [. . .]

For full article, see https://ewnews.com/new-tern-art-gallery-opens-amanda-coulson-named-founding-director

See Amanda Coulson’s bio here: https://nagb.org.bs/bio-amanda-coulson