Appointment of Muriel Enjalran as director of the regional collections of contemporary art (Frac) in Marseille

Following approval by Roselyne Bachelot, Minister of Culture, and Renaud Muselier, president of the Région Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur and president of Régions de France, #richardgaly, president of the Fonds régional d’art contemporain Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (Marseille), is pleased to announce the appointment of #murielenjalran as director of the #frac, in accordance with the proposal of the administration council.

The guiding lines set down by Murel Enjalran for her ambitious and generous artistic project entitled « Making society », combined with her professional skills, her experience as an artistic and managerial director, as well as the considerable recognition she has earned from her peers, clinched the jury’s decision.

Muriel Enjalran offers a programme that is based on innovative, decompartmentalised, inclusive formats that make it possible to reach out to the public and make the #frac a true community space for residents of La Joliette and #marseille. She is eager to support artists living in the Région Sud, building national and international professional links with and for them. 

Through the Frac’s very structure, along with the presentation of its collection in the region and the international ambition of her programme, she wishes to interconnect several territorial levels : district, city, region, France and world, particularly the Mediterranean world.

After earning a master’s in history for her thesis entitled « #marseille, Commerce et échanges dans l’art du XVIIIe » and a post-graduate diploma in #contemporaryart under the supervision of Serge Lemoine, #murielenjalran worked as an independent art critic and curator, notably serving as associate curator for the first edition of the Biennale de Belleville and for the Marrakesh Biennale. Her research 
examines artists’ involvement in public space, particularly exploring art activism in the field of history, and the possibilities of visual sociology. 

She was general secretary and project coordinator of d.c.a, French Association for the Development of Centres d’Art from 2006 to 2015. Since then, #murielenjalran has been the director of the CRP/ Centre régional de la photographie in Douchy-les-Mines, running one of the first art centres in France to receive the label « #contemporaryart centre of national interest ».

In addition to collaborating with Independent Curators International in New York since 2012, she is also a member of both the International Association of Art Critics (AICA) and the acquisition and commission committee of the Centre national des arts plastiques. In 2015, she was awarded a curatorial residency at the Hyde Park Art Center in Chicago. In 2020, she joined the committee of experts organising the cultural programme for the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics.

We are grateful for the work of her predecessor at the helm of the #frac Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, Pascal Neveux, who directed the institution for fourteen years and leaves an impressive record of achievements. He guided its transformation into a second-generation 
Frac and promoted its work throughout the whole territory in conjunction with numerous partners.