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Invited during the XV edition of CSAV - Artists' Research Laboratory, conducted by Walid Raad, Catherine David articulated an answer to the question: "In a context dominated by a globalized market and by many deficiencies - in terms of education, production of speeches, conservation, and transmission - relating to the contemporary cultural heritage in the Arab world, what are the conditions of possibility, and visibility, experimental aesthetics in the Middle East? "
During the dense conference, which took advantage of her long experience in the field, Catherine David described a complex and at the same time fascinating scenario full of potential. A landscape in which the lack of institutional support becomes the stimulus to find new solutions and formats, capable of responding effectively to the complexity of the situation. Without the will to propose definitive solutions, Catherine David thus highlighted the many aspects of a region which is, as she claimed, nothing more than "a mirror of our world".

Catherine David (Paris, 1954), is an art historian, critic and curator. After studying at the Sorbonne and the’École du Louvre, she worked as a curator at the Centre Pompidou. In 1997 she was artistic director of Documenta X, the first woman to hold this role. She later focused her research on the Middle Eastern art scene and directed the project Contemporary Arab Representations (Représentations Arabes Contemporaines). This was followed by several exhibitions dedicated to artists from the region, such as The Iraqi Equation (Berlin and Barcelona, 2006), DI / VISIONS. Culture and Politics of the Middle East (Berlin, 2007) and a retrospective in honor of the Iranian photographer Bahman Jalali (Barcelona, 2009). In 2009 she was also artistic director of the first national presentation of ADACH (Abu Dhabi Authority for Culture and Heritage) Pavillion at the Venice Biennale.
In 2014, she curated Unedited History, Iran 1960-2014 at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, and in 2017 Dia al-Azzawi: A Retrospective (From 1963 until Tomorrow) at Mathaf and Al Riwaq in Doha. Since 2014 she is deputy director of the MNAM (Musée National d'Art Moderne, at the Centre Pompidou). Here she has curated several projects, among which: Wifredo Lam (2015); Memories from the futures. Indian modernity (2017) and Latiff Mohidin : Pago Pago (1960-1969) (2018).