Antonio Sergio Bessa

Antonio Sergio Bessa is chief curator emeritus at the Bronx Museum of the Arts. A scholar of concrete poetry, Bessa has organized several critically acclaimed exhibitions on themes related to text-based art, and has published essays on concrete poetry.

Biography

Bessa is chief curator emeritus at the Bronx Museum of the Arts. A scholar of concrete poetry, he has organized several critically acclaimed exhibitions on themes related to text-based art, and his essays on concrete poetry have been published in several anthologies, journals, and websites including ubu.com and fahlstrom.com. He is the author of Öyvind Fahlström: The Art of Writing, and editor of Novas: Selected Writings of Haroldo de Campos (in collaboration with Odile Cisneros), and Mary Ellen Solt: Toward a Theory of Concrete Poetry. Bessa organized several exhibitions at the Bronx Museum including Joan Semmel: A Lucid Eye (2013), Paulo Bruscky: Art is our Last Hope (2013), Martin Wong: Human Instamatic (2015), Gordon Matta-Clark: Anarchitect (2017), The Life and Times of Alvin Baltrop (2019). As an educator, he worked as a contractual instructor at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, from 1998 through 2004; led a seminar on artists' writings at the School of Visual Arts (2001-2004); and taught Museum Education Issues at Columbia University’s Teachers College from 2006 to 2016. Bessa was a visiting faculty member in the Museum Fellows Term Program for Spring 2022 and Spring 2024.