Despoina Tzanou is an independent curator, writer and researcher based in Athens, GR. Her curatorial practice and creative writing draw on literature, myth, and folk stories to examine how dominant narratives shape collective understanding. Bringing together feminist, decolonial, and speculative perspectives, her work looks at how cultural symbols and structures take hold and how they might be reimagined in relation to social, political, psychological, technological, and environmental concerns.

Her projects have been featured in Mousse, frieze, émergent, Artsy, Flash Art, El Pais, Artsy, CURA, Art Viewer, KUBA Paris, Anniversary, Umbigo, Publico, Time Out , and The Art Newspaper, among others.

Tzanou holds an MA in Curating from the London Metropolitan University in partnership with the Whitechapel Gallery (2017); and a BA in Theory and History of Art from the Athens School of Fine Arts (2015). 

While in London, she collaborated with the Whitechapel Gallery and Cell Project Space, and co founded DOW Curatorial Collective (2016-2018), presenting exhibitions outside traditional gallery settings.

In 2018, Tzanou took on the role of Director and Curator at Duarte Sequeira Gallery in Braga, which opened in 2019. She worked closely with emerging and established artists on research driven projects, developed an artist residency and sculpture park programme, and played a key role in the gallery's expansion to Seoul in 2021. She also initiated GDS WAREHOUSE, a project space launched in 2021 in partnership with Semibreve Experimental Electronic Music Festival and supported by FRAME Funding Finland.

Her time in Portugal included frequent collaborations with Forum Arte Braga as a guest curator and writer. She also expanded her writing practice through curatorial texts and publications and developed interdisciplinary initiatives such as talks, workshops, and radio sets.

In 2022/2023, Tzanou was awarded the ARTWORKS Curatorial Fellowship by the Stavros Niarchos Cultural Foundation, Athens.

Since 2025 she is part of  Sylvia Kouvali Gallery (Athens - London).

(CV upon request)