Atlanta Contemporary Announces Floyd Hall as New Executive Director

Hall to bring experience leading cultural and media institutions, as Atlanta Contemporary looks to expand the national influence of contemporary artists from the South.

ATLANTA —January 8, 2024—Atlanta Contemporary is pleased to introduce Floyd Hall as the new Executive Director, setting the stage for an exciting future. The selection follows a national search, guided by a months-long search process, with input from staff and the board of directors. Hall was selected based on his experience leading a cadre of cultural, media, arts institutions, and non-profits. His experience guiding creative strategy and production for national brands and his avant-garde curatorial vision fusing science, technology, and art also played a factor. Hall will start on January 16, 2024.

"I’m a product of Atlanta and this feels like the most amazing opportunity to add to the legacy of my hometown. It’s a dream come true.” - Floyd Hall

Katina Asbell, Co-Chair of the Board of Directors, said: "We are thrilled to welcome Floyd Hall as the new Executive Director of Atlanta Contemporary. His extensive leadership experience in cultural, media, and arts institutions, coupled with his innovative curatorial vision merging science, technology, and art, positions us for an exciting and transformative chapter in our journey as a leading force in contemporary art."

Hall has been active in the cultural strategy and art space for 15 years. His career is supported by his proven track record of success co-creating and leading innovative Atlanta-based institutions.

Hall most recently served as Interim Director at Science Gallery Atlanta, where he curated large-scale exhibits that merged art, science, design, and technology, with an emphasis on public engagement with youth. In 2023, he curated JUSTICE, the first exhibition fully produced by Science Gallery Atlanta.

Hall is the Co-Founder of Canopy Atlanta, a regional journalism non-profit that amplifies the voices of local communities through collaborating to reach national media platforms. Canopy Atlanta has raised over $1M from local and national foundations and individual donors, demonstrating his strength in fundraising for programming that expands spaces that address critical social issues.

Hall’s leadership in brand strategy with Flux Projects helped inform his organizational and curatorial perspective on the dialogue between art installations and public audiences, and he’s also developed thought-provoking narrative performance experiences, such as Pop-Up Zine Atlanta (2019).

Hall has maintained his culture-centered strategic leadership and commitment to promoting high quality programming across a range of artistic disciplines through curating, production, and writing.

Hall co-curated HOOKED in 2022, which was named “Best of Atlanta'' by Atlanta Magazine (Science Gallery Atlanta) and The Future Happened, as Co-Curator in 2021 (Museum of Design Atlanta). He produced the regional podcast Bottom of the Map (2019-2021) with National Public Radio station WABE, and produced and hosted Atlanta Legacy Makers (2020) for Central Atlanta Progress and the City of Atlanta.

Hall’s writing can be found throughout influential art media, including Atlanta Magazine, ArtsATL, and ART PAPERS, and in 2022, Hall was selected and participated as a Fellow for the Hambidge Creative Residency and Cross-Pollination Art Lab.

Atlanta Contemporary celebrated 50 years of serving the Atlanta art community in 2023. Under Hall’s visionary leadership, the Atlanta Contemporary is poised to expand the impact of artists from the South, as Atlanta becomes a national art destination.

“The “idea” of Atlanta extends well-beyond the physical boundaries of Atlanta, and our work at Atlanta Contemporary presents an exciting opportunity to create dialogue between everything that is happening here and what is happening across time zones and timelines at any given moment.” Floyd Hall

Hall has an M.B.A from Columbia University Graduate School of Business; a B.S.in Mathematics from Morehouse College; and a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology.

About Atlanta Contemporary

Founded in 1973 as Nexus, a grassroots artists’ cooperative, Atlanta Contemporary has since become one of the southeast’s leading contemporary art centers. Atlanta Contemporary presents over 200 consequential artists and creatives from the local, national, and international art scenes through our various exhibition, project spaces, and programs each year.

Atlanta Contemporary believes in the power of contemporary art to change lives and that anyone - regardless of age, race, gender, socio-economic status, or any perceived limitations - should have access to innovative and engaging contemporary art and programs. Rooted in the very fabric of our founders, Atlanta Contemporary has been artist-centered and art-driven since 1973.

Visit atlantacontemporary.org to learn more.