Kungl. Konsthögskolan | Royal Institute of Art
Flaggmansvägen 1
Stockholm
T +46 (0) 8 614 40 00
F +46 (0) 8 679 86 26
The Swedish Government and the Royal Institute of Art (Kung. Konsthögskolan) has appointed Marta Kuzma as its new Vice-Chancellor. As Vice-Chancellor, Kuzma will oversee the future development of the institution in its entirety, including the development of its educational structure and research initiatives, bringing a vision that reflects upon the changing role of art education within a collaborative and invigorated environment for artistic production and architecture. The Royal Institute of Art, a higher art education institution founded in 1735 with premises in Stockholm, offers undergraduate and post-graduate programmes in fine arts and serves as a forum for education on an advanced level in architecture and urban planning through its School of Architecture (Mejan Arc).
In response to the appointment, Berit Svedberg, Chair of the Royal Institute of Art Board, has said: “I am very happy that the government appoints such an internationally established actor in the art world as our new Vice-Chancellor. Marta Kuzma has a genuine belief in art and architecture’s potential in today’s society, which she is able to convey. She is a visionary leader with an ability to foster energy and commitment. Thus, she has all the qualities required to direct the work at Sweden’s largest art academy.” The appointment of Marta Kuzma as Vice-Chancellor follows the unanimous support expressed by the institution’s board, its staff and students.
Stressing a commitment to the institution’s emphasis on a close interaction between teachers and students and on a climate of critical engagement, Kuzma notes: “In this age of creative capitalism, art and the artist are evolving amid new typologies of production and productivity, with the artist entering into the culture of entrepreneurship and management, with the ‘artwork’ being everywhere and nowhere at the same time, and with the international social network behaving as artistic material in its own right. In such times, it is important to understand that no matter how formidable and historically rooted our educational institutions may be, the challenge for them is to recognise that despite these symptoms and realities, leadership in the field should not lean toward mere authority, instrumentalisation or corporate relations, but to build a leadership, that in recognising these structural changes and paradigm shifts, is creative in character, visionary in formulation, critical in structure and acumen, generous in terms of community building, and collaborative with those who constitute the institution as a whole—its students, its staff and its professors—in an effort to strengthen the school as a challenging and self-conscious institution.”
With twenty-five years of international experience in the field of contemporary art as institutional director, curator and educator, Kuzma has been engaged in enquiries around artist production amid changing conditions and within varying cultural contexts. Most recently, Kuzma completed an eight-year term as Director of the Office for Contemporary Art Norway (OCA), where she established an internationally noted research-based programme of exhibitions, lectures and seminars. She has previously directed programmes at the International Center of Photography in New York and then the founding Director of the Soros Center for Contemporary Art in Kyiv. Marta Kuzma was co-curator of Manifesta 5 in San Sebastian, and served as a member of the curatorial team of dOCUMENTA (13). Kuzma is a Professor of Art Theory at Istituto Universitario di Architettura di Venezia and Guest Professor at Universita Bocconi Milano.
Contact
Anne Joki Jakobsson, Communications Manager: T +46 (0) 70 750 40 10 / [email protected]
