Mentor Profile: Holly O'Brien on how curatorial ideas can create space for complexity, contradiction and voices that are less visible

We provide monthly opportunities for our Professional Members to have one to one discussions with experts in the visual arts about their practice and development aspirations. We asked one of our mentors, arts producer and curator, Holly O'Brien, what her interests are and what type of support she can offer.
 

Are there particular areas relating to the visual arts profession / or visual arts research that you feel you could help artists with as a mentor?  

Having worked across organisational, freelance and independent curatorial contexts, I can help demystify the curatorial process for artists and offer insight into how curators actually find and think about artists. I can support artists with articulating their work clearly, building relationships with curators and organisations, researching opportunities and increasing their visibility, as well as navigating the practical realities of projects, from briefs and budgets to spaces and audiences. I would also be interested in helping artists think about their work in context, what conversations it could enter into, where it might sit and how an idea could develop into a wider project.

What is it about these areas that feels the most interesting to you right now?

What interests me most at the moment is the relationship between an artist’s work and the context in which it is presented. I’m particularly interested in how curatorial ideas can create space for complexity, contradiction and voices or histories that are less visible, and how research can open up new ways of understanding a work.

Would you like to share a few things you are working on right now, or anything you have coming up?

I'm currently working on The Flowers Stand Silently, Witnessing, an exhibition I’m really excited to be curating at Cambridge Artworks & Artspace from 15–18 October, bringing together the practices of Maisy Aykroyd, Theo Panagopoulos and Sid White Jones. The exhibition explores how we remember and reconcile with the past through moving image, photography and printmaking, with flowers and ephemera providing a starting point for thinking about memory, history and overlooked stories. Alongside this, I’m continuing to work closely with Director Annabelle Campbell to develop the programme at David Parr House as we approach our centenary in 2027. The year will mark 100 years of caring for the house, since David Parr’s death in 1927 and his granddaughter Elsie Palmer taking up residence. I’m working across exhibitions, talks, workshops and collaborations as part of the programme. 

Holly O’Brien is an arts producer and curator delivering exhibitions, public programmes and digital projects independently and within museums and arts organisations. Her work brings contemporary artists into conversation with collections, archives and museums, creating new ways for audiences to encounter histories and heritage. Her curatorial practice is shaped by an interest in historical materials, storytelling, archives and fiction, and in the ways artists can work with these to uncover overlooked, hidden or lost stories. She is interested in history as fluid, nonlinear and continually changing, and in collections not as fixed or complete, but as spaces for conversation and creative intervention. She is particularly interested in how artists can bring fragments of history into focus, making them newly visible, relevant or open to question, while introducing perspectives and voices that may be absent from existing collections and archives. She is currently Programme and Marketing Manager at David Parr House, where she manages a programme of exhibitions, talks and workshops alongside audience development, marketing and digital strategy. She is also undertaking the Associateship of the Museums Association (AMA). 

The exhibition programme at David Parr House in Cambridge is curated by Holly O'Brien and Director Annabelle Campbell. These images are from House Guests, which is part of the David Parr House annual exhibition programme. This programme provides opportunities for contemporary artists and uses the house in a meaningful way to support artistic practice and experimentation.

We aim for these Critical Friend Conversations to be held in a space free from judgement, requiring both participants to be fully present and ready to listen. Conversations offer reciprocal benefits and are made even more valuable by continued engagement in the Axis Community, our dedicated online platform for members. 

But don’t just take our word for it! Here's what some members have said about their experience here