John Tain, curator of “Of Mountains and Seas”, previously was based in Hong Kong as Head of Research at  Asia Art Archive, (AAA, 2017-2023).  His projects there include “Expansions, Translations,” for documenta fifteen (2022); the Art Schools of Asia seminar and symposium (2021-22); the exhibition Crafting Communities (2020), devoted to Thailand-based Womanifesto; MAHASSA (Modern Art Histories in and across Africa, and South and Southeast Asia, 2019-2020), a collaboration with the Dhaka Art Summit and the Institute for Comparative Modernities at Cornell University; as well as the Guerrilla Girls first commission in Asia (2018). He has served as a series editor for Afterall’s Exhibition Histories, and is a co-editor for the Intersecting Modernisms project, with Pamela Corey, Iftikhar Dadi, Salah Hassan, Mari-Carmen Ramirez, and Ming Tiampo. He also serves as an advisor for Asia Forum, an ongoing collateral event at the Venice Biennale, and on the advisory committee of the Hauser & Wirth Institute.  He was previously a curator for modern and contemporary collections at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles (2007-2017).