One of Scotland's leading artistic curators is to be the new director of GI, the Glasgow International Festival of Contemporary Art, it was announced yesterday.

Katrina Brown, who helped make Dundee Contemporary Arts one of the prime visual art venues and established the Glasgow-based Common Guild arts organisation, is to lead the next two GI festivals, in 2010 and 2012.

Ms Brown, from Glasgow is one of the most respected figures in Scotland's art scene - she was a committee member for the Transmission Gallery from 1991 to 1994, a curator at the Tramway and Tate Liverpool, curated the exhibitions at the DCA from 1997 to 2007 and established the Common Guild last year.

She said that the next GI festival would mark, in 2010, the 20th anniversary of Glasgow reign as European City of Culture.

"This is a truly exciting and important opportunity, and the next festival will be a significant moment to reflect on our achievements in the visual arts and to look at what more we can do," she said.

"GI allows for a unique celebration of the visual arts in the city through a two-way mirror, reflecting what is happening in the city while allowing us to look outward."

Ms Brown, born and educated in Glasgow, is continuing a family tradition by holding a key artistic position in the city.

Her father, Councillor William Brown, sat on the art galleries and museums committee of the council in 1952, and was a key figure in buying Salvador Dali's Christ of St John of the Cross for Glasgow, for a then-controversial sum of £8200.

Mark O'Neill, chairman of the steering group of the GI festival, said: "Building on the solid foundations created by the festival's first curator Francis McKee, the stage is set for GI to become one of the world's leading international art festivals."