A conference on curatorial knowledge production
Saturday, 15 November, 2014, 10am–6pm
Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK)
Toni Areal, Pfingstweidstrasse 96
Hörsaal 1
8005 Zürich
Switzerland
The Research Platform for Curatorial and Cross-disciplinary Cultural Studies practice-based Doctoral programme (University of Reading, Fine Art Department of Art and the Postgraduate programme in Curating, ICS, ZHdK) presents a conference on curatorial knowledge production.
The last aspect of art/curating has been the hidden driving force behind many curatorial projects. An argument can be made on the basis of various theoretical approaches about how art has an impact on social conditions, how it can achieve a political dimension after all. Jacques Ranciere argues that certain forms of art, namely the aesthetic regime of visibility, express “equivalence” or “equality,” and that this is true of postmodernism. This viewpoint can also be critiqued from a perspective which takes into consideration the power struggles in the art field.
Contemporary curating exists as a media conglomerate, the production of meaning is achieved through a combination of artworks, photographs, commentary, publications, design, gestures, music, film, press releases, websites and interviews. It is situated in a specific political and cultural context. To analyse these complex situations we need a variety of approaches, for every project the combination could alter, that makes a bricolage of methodical approaches necessary.
10h
Welcome and introduction
Sigrid Schade and Dorothee Richter: “Outline of a theory of curating”
10:30–11:30h
Felix Ensslin: “What is the Subject and Discourse of Curating?”
11:30h–noon
Coffee break
noon–12:30h
Elke Krasny: “Curating as Caring. Mapping Affinities, Affects, Feminist Durationality, and Solidarity”
12:30–13h
Avi Feldman: “Curating the Law – Reflection on Contemporary Art and Law”
13–13:30h
Allan Siegel: “Museums, curators and precarious democracies”
13:30–14h
Discussion
14–14:45h
Lunch break
14:45–15h
Video: Szuper Gallery, Work/Arbeit/Rabota (2009), 15 mins
15–15:30h
Julia Moritz: “Curating Theory—Tendecies, Tools, Trouble”
15:30–16h
Michael Birchall: “Shifting power: the curator as producer in socially engaged art”
16–16:30h
Fredi Fischli and Niels Olsen: “Curating Architecture”
16:30–17h
Q & A
Short break and performance by Fender Schrade and Nana Hüleswig
Performance: NANA&FRIENDS, Only strong characters can surrender (2014)
