Lauren Cornell has many reasons for championing difficult art: "Because it is new, and thus not accepted or considered ugly and unhip; because it is old and forgotten and important; because it is hard to show in a gallery; because it is political; because it is feminist. . . . " Cornell, a 34-year-old curator and Manhattan native, got her start in experimental film, running the acclaimed Ocularis microcinema in Brooklyn. In 2005 she joined the New Museum, where she worked on the inaugural Generational show, "Younger Than Jesus," and served as the executive director of the digital art organization Rhizome. This summer she stepped down from Rhizome to focus on one of her biggest projects: the third edition of the Generational, set to open in 2015, which she is curating with the artist Ryan Trecartin. One of the most pressing questions on my mind is how art can point toward the future in a moment when we're so deeply obsessed with the past. Stay tuned.