About
Chris Reitz is Director and Chair of the Hite Institute of Art + Design and Associate Professor of Critical and Curatorial Studies. His research focuses on transnational art and exhibitions of the past 30 years, with a particular emphasis on themes and practices of labor and leisure.
Professor Reitz has worked as a project manager at Public Art Fund in New York and as an independent curator. His first book, Martin Kippenberger: Everything is Everywhere, was published by MIT Press in 2023. His writing has appeared in a number of prominent academic and trade publications, including Nonsite, October, Texte zur Kunst, N+1, The White Review, Paper Monument, The Baffler, and Martin Kippenberger’s Catalogue Raisonne of the Paintings, Volume III.
Professor Reitz serves as the Hite Institute of Art + Design's primary curator, and in that capacity has organized solo exhibitions for Judy Chicago, Sanford Biggers, Sislej Xhafa, For Freedoms, and Peter Williams, in addition to the group exhibitions Painting in the Network, Algorithm and Appropriation and Conspiratorial Aesthetics, among others.
Professor Reitz is also a member of Louisville’s Commission on Public Art and was appointed to the mayor’s commission tasked with making recommendations concerning Louisville’s contested monuments. For his work in service to the community he received the President’s Distinguished Faculty award in 2018.
Research
Contemporary Art, Art and Exhibitions in the Era of Neoliberalism, The Art Market, Critical Theory
Course Offerings
CCS 547/647 Introduction to Critical and Curatorial Studies I, Graduate Seminar
CCS 548/648 Introduction to Critical and Curatorial Studies II, Graduate Seminar
CCS 649 Curatorial Internship
ARTH 342 The Avant-Garde
ARTH 541/642 Theories & Methods in the Visual Arts
ARTH Art and Activism
Selected Exhibitions
Lesch/Oldham: Needlework,” Cressman Center for Visual Arts, Louisville, KY. January-March, 2023.
“Peter Williams: Incarceration,” Cressman Center for Visual Arts, Louisville, KY. February 7-March 21st, 2020.
“Conspiratorial Aesthetics" (featuring work by Raqs Media Collective, Walid Raad/The Atlas Group, Cara Benedetto, !Mediengrugge Bitnik, Deb Sokolow), Cressman Center for Visual Arts, Louisville, KY. March 1 - April 6, 2018.
"For Freedoms: Make America Great Again" (featuring work by Hank Willis Thomas, Eric Gottesman, Dread Scott, Cassils, Rosa White, Trevor Paglen, and others), Cressman Center for Visual Arts, Louisville, KY. March 2 - April 7, 2018.
"Painting in the Network: Algorithm and Appropriation" (featuring work by Gabriel Orozco, Cory Arcangel, TaborRobak, David Rhodes, Laeh Gleen, Siebren Versteeg). Cressman Center for Visual Arts. February 10 - April 8, 2017.
"Sislej Xhafa: millimeter sentiments," Cressman Center for Visual Arts. September 2 - October 20, 2016 (named one of the best shows in the South, 2016, by Burnaway.org).
"New Monuments: Sanford Biggers; Laocoon,” Cressman Center for Visual Arts, Louisville KY. May 4-July 2, 2016.
“Blind Contours,” Zephyr Gallery, Louisville, KY. April 1-May 21, 2016.
“Judy Chicago: Fire Works,” Cressman Center for Visual Arts. February 18-April 16, 2016
“Play:,” Irgin Sena, Oliver Michaels, and Kenneth Tin-Kin Hung, Galerie Vanessa Quang, Paris. March 20-April 11, 2009.
“Xaviera Simmons; Bronx as Studio,” Public Art Fund, New York. June 2-20th, 2008.