Amanda Kelly, Associate Director, Pickles PR (Valencia, Spain)

With nearly two decades of experience across journalism, academia, publishing, and strategic communications, Amanda Kelly advises museums and cultural institutions on media strategy, public engagement, and cultural positioning. Her international collaborations include the National Gallery Singapore, the National Museum of Contemporary Art Athens (EMΣT), Padimai Art & Tech Studio, Galleri F 15, the National Gallery of Canada, and the Mucha Foundation, among others. She is also an adjunct professor at IE University.

Narrating complexity: International communications strategies for museums

In today’s media environment, exhibitions do not enter public discourse neutrally: they are already susceptible to simplification, politicisation, and cultural misunderstanding. For museums working with socially charged subjects, communications outreach can be a critical tool for building trust and sustaining meaningful public engagement.

Drawing on more than two decades of experience across journalism and international arts communications, Amanda Kelly explores how cultural communications strategies can support nuanced public understanding by examining how institutions in two distinct cultural and political contexts use international communications outreach to build credibility, relevance, and sustained engagement.

In Singapore and Athens, these conversations unfold within environments shaped by cosmopolitanism, political tension, layered histories, and rapidly changing societies. Through programming that addresses sexuality, feminism, displacement, postcolonial histories, and questions of belonging, the National Gallery Singapore and the National Museum of Contemporary Art Athens (EMΣT) seek to create spaces where audiences can encounter difference, complexity, and multiple perspectives.

Although shaped by different regional histories, both institutions share a commitment to engaging diverse publics through exhibitions and collection strategies that foreground plurality, cultural exchange, and underrepresented perspectives. Each positions art as a platform for dialogue around identity, memory, migration, inequality, and social transformation, while challenging Eurocentric narratives.

The presentation explores how communications outreach can support public understanding by creating space for nuance, context, and sustained engagement. It addresses practical approaches to international media relations, including journalist visits, long-form editorial pitching, strategic partnerships, and informal dialogue-building opportunities. Particular attention will be given to how museums can communicate politically and socially sensitive subjects to international audiences without reducing complexity or curatorial intent.

Ultimately, the session reflects on how thoughtful communications strategies can broaden international conversations around contemporary art, strengthen institutional credibility, and foster deeper forms of cultural exchange across different publics and regions.