Simon Wright has held public engagement, exhibition, curatorial and executive management positions in private, public gallery and museum realms since 1993.
As Assistant Director (Learning + Public Engagement) at QAGOMA, he currently has Executive oversight of a broad range of community-facing and audience-centric portfolio responsibilities, including:
Public Engagement (The Children’s Art Centre, Public Programs, Member Services), Learning (Education, Group and Community Access, Volunteer Guides and Regional Services), Information Services (Library) and QAGOMA Publishing.
He also manages all Design department outcomes across Exhibition, Graphic, Web and Multimedia, Workshop and Installation teams.
He has worked on 350+ exhibition projects, and has been actively involved in the national arts community beyond QAGOMA, serving in various governance capacities, such as The Commissioner’s Council for Australia at the 53rd Venice Biennale and on The Institute of Modern Art Board of Directors for almost 10 years.
In 2014 he became Founder Benefactor of the QAGOMA Foundation, and in 2018, participated in the Asialink Business Leaders program at University of Melbourne. He has a passion supporting regional arts development and community arts practice, audience engagement and participation, and an advocate for the nexus between creativity and wellbeing.
Since 2005 he has been regularly invited to judge art awards around the State, including: The Queensland Regional Art Awards, The 1770 Art Award, The Rio Tinto Martin Hanson Award (Gladstone Regional Art Gallery), THIESS Art Awards, Tattersall’s Art Prize, The Churchie National Emerging Artist Awards, The Blunt Edge Portrait Prize (Cairns), The Gold Coast Art + Design Awards, and The Chapman+Bailey Art Prize.