Category: Museum Director
Nationality: German
Last Year: 19

As artistic director of the Ringier Collection (since 1995) and director of the Kunsthalle Zurich (since 2001), Ruf has a wealth of experience when it comes to channelling private funds (the Kunsthalle is funded by a Kunstverein) into public arenas. But while the boards of every museum would say that such a skill is crucial in a prospective director’s repertoire, it’s not the sole reason Ruf has steadily risen up this list. In her capacity at Ringier she has spent the past six years enabling a full inventory of work by the late American artist Mark Morrisroe to be assembled and stored at the Fotomuseum Winterthur. Meanwhile her recent exhibitions at the Kunsthalle (temporarily housed in the Museum Bärengasse) – Rosemarie Trockel, Heimo Zobernig, Bruce Conner and Walid Raad – read like a catalogue of contemporary artistic cool. Where she goes, others follow, we said last year, and this continues to be the case. So what lies ahead? Nuclear power: Ruf has recently been appointed to the newly constituted cultural advisory board of CERN, home to Europe’s Large Hadron Collider. It’ll be interesting to see who follows her there.