ICA Director To Resign

The artistic director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts, Ekow Eshun, used a soft-ball interview in Saturday's Guardian to publicly announce his resignation. Eshun has presided over a rocky five years at the ICA: though audience numbers were up, a financial crisis created by bad luck (the recession) and poor judgment (the scrapping of Beck's Futures and the abolition of the entrance fee) left the Institute on the brink of insolvency earlier this year. Though things have since improved, Eshun's departure means that the ICA is now looking for a new individual to lead it forwards and tackle the ongoing conundrum: in a world where contemporary art is amply catered for, what does it stand for?