Marina Paulenka is Director of Exhibitions for Fotografiska Berlin where she is responsible for museum’s exhibition strategy. Fotografiska is a museum experience for the modern world and a premiere destination for photography and culture.
Paulenka has 15 years of experience in artistic direction, curating, education, leadership, management and development in culture and art institutions and organisations, but also in her own artistic practice.
She was Artistic Director of UNSEEN Foundantion and UNSEEN, an Amsterdam based platform for contemporary photography that presents the latest developments in the field of photography and amplifies the careers of boundary-pushing artists.
Prior to her role at Unseen, she worked as Artistic Director and Curator of the Organ Vida International Photography Festival, the leading institution for contemporary photography in Croatia.
Paulenka is a member of the Creative Committee at the Bristol Photo festival, a guest curator at FUTURES Photography, and a keynote curator for FORMAT21 International Photography Festival. She is the recipient of the Lucie Awards 2018 for a best curator/ exhibition of the year for the exhibition “Engaged, Active, Aware: Women Perspectives Now”.
So far she has curated numerous exhibitions and work with artists such as Tabita Rezaire, Juliana Huxtable, Martine Gutierrez, Dana Lixenberg, Zanele Muholi, Hannah Starkey, Nina Berman, Amalia Ulman, Laia Abril, Morehshin Allahayari and many others.
Paulenka nominates photographers for The Joop Swart Masterclass, the Prix Pictet, the Deutsche Bòˆrse Photography Foundation Prize and she is an international juror and portfolio reviewer at many institutions, awards and festivals worldwide including the Les Rencontres d’Arles, Hamburg Triennial, Plat(t)form Winterthur, Robert Capa Prize, FORMAT.