Christine Clark (currently on extended leave) was appointed Exhibitions Manager at the National Portrait Gallery in 2005. She has been an active contributor in establishing the Gallery’s relationships with collegial institutions and artists in Asia, fostering relationships with several key institutions and artists across Australia, developing the Gallery’s commissioning program and realising the Gallery’s extensive exhibition touring program. She was part of the collaborative team that implemented the National Photographic Portrait Prize, Digital Portrait Award and the Darling Portrait Prize. Christine has forged strong ties between the Gallery and the National Gallery of Indonesia through several initiatives including Masters of Modern Indonesian Portraiture (2014-15), and the generation of ongoing exchange including a capacity building workshop held in Indonesia (2017). The Gallery received ICOM Australia’s 2015 (International Council of Museums) Australia Award for International Relations for these initiatives.
Many of Christine’s projects emphasise cross-cultural intersections, interactions and shared histories. She is interested in ways of reconfiguring national histories and storytelling and offering alternative perspectives. Her curatorial projects for the National Portrait Gallery include So Fine: Contemporary women artists make Australian history (2018, with Dr Sarah Engledow), Beyond the Self: Contemporary Portraiture from Asia (2011); My Favourite Australian (2008, with Andrew Sayers, and Amanda Duthie and Debbie Lee ABC) and Flash: Australian athletes in Focus (2006, with Andrew Sayers).
