An Paenhuysen is a curator, art critic and writer living in Berlin. She studied cultural history at the University of Leuven, Belgium, where she obtained a PhD researching the cultural criticism of the Belgian avant-garde in the 1920s. As a postdoctoral fellow, An researched at UC Berkeley, Columbia University in New York and Humboldt-University Berlin.

Her curatorial career started at Hamburger Bahnhof – Museum of Contemporary Art, Berlin, in 2009, co-curating an exhibition showcasing Paul Pfeiffer and, in 2010, together with Wolfgang Müller, the exhibition entitled Pause. Valeska Gert: Bewegte Fragmente. Since then, she has curated various exhibitions such as “Gesture. Sign. Art. Deaf Culture / Hearing Culture” (2012), “Up and Down, and Today’s Avant-Garde as Tomorrow’s Salon Art?” (2017) and “Chromosome XY (2019)”. As a curator, An also accompanies the travelling exhibition “Rosemarie Trockel” by ifa, the Institute of Foreign Affairs in Germany. In 2019, she became the director of the project space The House of The Deadly Doris, Berlin.

In 2020, An started an artistic writing publishing project, called AAAAA PPPPP Publishing as well as taught art writing workshops at Node Center for Curatorial Studies, Berlin Writer’s Workshop, IED Venice, Zeta Gallery Tirana, a.o. Check out her art blog.