Award-winning journalist, editor, and author Tina Brown will guest-curate the 20th annual Aspen Ideas Festival. The Aspen Institute’s signature summer festival takes place in Colorado from June 23 – 29 and is held in partnership with NBCUniversal News Group. The event is the nation’s premier gathering place for hundreds of leaders and innovators from around the globe to engage in deep, inquisitive discussion alongside thousands of attendees.
As the Festival’s first external curator, Tina Brown will be involved in developing all aspects of the event’s agenda, including helping to identify the critical challenges impacting our world today and the compelling speakers who are shedding light on and addressing them. In the months to come, she will work closely with the Aspen Institute’s Public Programs team led by Killeen Brettmann and NBCUniversal News Group to create bold new programming concepts while building upon the best traditions of the Festival.
“It will be thrilling to work on one of the world’s most prestigious ideas festivals with the extraordinarily talented Aspen Institute team who have built this glorious convening into a furnace of thoughtful conversation,” Brown said.
“Whether she is running a revered news publication, penning a New York Times bestseller, or amplifying the leadership of women and girls around the world, Tina Brown has demonstrated an extraordinary ability to identify and explore the most important issues facing the world today,” said Dan Porterfield, President and CEO of the Aspen Institute. “As we prepare to celebrate two decades of the Aspen Ideas Festival, we are excited to partner with Tina to curate this year’s content and design new ways for audiences to engage with this flagship Aspen Institute public platform.”
The Institute is honored to welcome Oxford graduate and acclaimed figure in the world of journalism and media, Tina Brown, and to leverage her expertise and more than 30 years in the news and media industry for curation of the 20th Aspen Ideas Festival. A recipient of the Commander of the British Empire (CBE) award for her significant contributions to journalism and inducted into the Magazine Editors’ Hall of Fame in 2007, Brown is renowned for her role as the former editor-in-chief of Tatler, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and The Daily Beast, which she also founded, as well as the author of bestselling books such as “The Diana Chronicles”, “The Palace Papers”, and the celebrated “The Vanity Fair Diaries”.
In addition to her remarkable journalism career, Brown has established herself as one of the pre-eminent conveners of intellectual and newsmaking events. In 2010, Brown coined the term “Live Journalism” and launched the Women in the World Summit which for ten years was the premiere live global convening for female leaders, CEOs, celebrities, global activists, and unknown firebrands. The annual summit was held at Lincoln Center to sold-out audiences over three days and expanded to London, Toronto, Delhi, Dubai, and San Paulo. In 2022, in a partnership with Reuters and Durham University, she founded the Truth Tellers, the Sir Harry Evans Global Summit in Investigative Journalism, held annually in London in honor of the legacy of her late husband, the celebrated crusading newspaper editor. She brought together more than 50 of the world’s leading and innovative journalists, editors, broadcasters, media owners, and documentarians, including Watergate legends Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein and HBO’s Succession creator and writer Jesse Armstrong.
Brown’s appetite for showcasing brilliant conversations has inspired her to play host to literary and political luminaries for over three decades, hosting countless book parties and events for people and causes she and Sir Harry believed in.
Organizers will share more information about the 2024 Aspen Ideas Festival later this year, including ticketing details, programming announcements, and further updates about Tina Brown’s role as curator. Passes will go on sale for the Festival on November 16, with early bird pricing available through the end of 2023. Visit www.aspenideas.org for the latest updates.
