Chancellor, Global Studies University
Dean, The Africa Institute, GSU
Professor of African Art History and Visual Studies
Salah M. Hassan is the Chancellor of Global Studies University (GSU), Dean of The Africa Institute, Sharjah, and a member of the university’s Board of Trustees. He has led The Africa Institute since its founding in 2018, and in 2023, he assumed his dual roles as Chancellor and Dean, underscoring his central role in shaping the academic and cultural vision of both institutions.
Hassan is an Emeritus Distinguished Professor of Arts and Sciences in Africana Studies at Cornell University, where he also directs the Institute for Comparative Modernities (ICM) and serves as Professor of Art History and Visual Culture. His academic and curatorial expertise spans several decades, contributing significantly to Africana studies and contemporary African art.
He previously served as the Madeleine Haas Russell Professor at Brandeis University in the Departments of African and Afro-American Studies and Fine Arts (2016–2018). He is an accomplished art critic, curator, and editor, known for co-founding and editing Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art (Duke University Press). He serves on the editorial advisory boards of Atlantica, Journal of Curatorial Studies, and the International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, and has been a consulting editor for African Arts.
Hassan has authored, edited, and co-edited numerous books, including Darfur and the Crisis of Governance: A Critical Reader (2009), Diaspora, Memory, Place (2008), and Ibrahim El Salahi: A Visionary Modernist (2012), and has contributed essays to journals, anthologies, and exhibition catalogues. He guest-edited a special issue of South Atlantic Quarterly titled African Modernism (2010).
His curatorial work includes major international exhibitions such as Authentic/Ex-Centric at the 49th Venice Biennale (2001), Unpacking Europe in Rotterdam (2001–02), and 3×3: Three Artists/Three Projects at Dak’Art (2004). More recently, he curated Kamala Ibrahim Ishag: States of Oneness at the Serpentine South, London (2023) and Gavin Jantjes: To Be Free! A Retrospective 1970–2023 at the Sharjah Art Foundation (2023). For SAF, his exhibitions include The Khartoum School: The Making of the Modern Art Movement in Sudan, 1945–2016 (2016–2017) and When Art Becomes Liberty: The Egyptian Surrealists (1938–1965) (2016).
Hassan’s contributions have been recognized with numerous grants and fellowships, including the J. Paul Getty Postdoctoral Fellowship, as well as support from the Sharjah Art Foundation, Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Andy Warhol Foundation, and Prince Claus Fund. In 2021, he was honored as Distinguished Professor by the College Art Association (CAA), the oldest and largest scholarly organization for the history and criticism of the visual arts.
