Saturday 1st May 2010, 10:30am - 6pm (registration 10am - 10.30am)
Early booking recommended.
Speakers: Beatrice von Bismarck (Academy of Visual Arts, Leipzig), Nav Haq (Arnolfini, Bristol), Maria Lind (Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, USA), Sarah Lowndes (Independent Curator, Glasgow), Bojana Pejic (Independent Curator, Berlin)
Introduced and chaired by Angela Dimitrakaki and Kirsten Lloyd (The University of Edinburgh)
Organised by The University of Edinburgh and presented in partnership with the National Galleries of Scotland, this conference brings together leading figures in the field to consider the potential and limitations of recent and emergent curatorial paradigms in contemporary art.
Over the past two decades, curators have risen to a new level of prominence in the artworld, challenging received hierarchies to define the narratives that frame our understanding of what art is and what it can do. During this time we have also witnessed an expansion of curatorial practice, contributing to shifts within art, its institutions as well as the broader social developments which have marked the transition from the 20th to the 21st century. Does this expansion of curating correspond to new, radical forms of agency in contemporary culture or is it complicit with a new administrative regime? Reflecting on practices not necessarily sanctioned, or indeed visible, through the institution, this one-day event with international and local speakers will discuss a range of approaches and geographical perspectives.
Venue: Hawthornden Lecture Theatre, National Gallery Complex, The Mound, Edinburgh
Tickets: £8/£5 concession (students) available from the information desk at the National Gallery Complex or call 0131 624 6560 9:30am - 4:30pm, Monday-Friday. Early booking recommended.
Information: www.curatingart.wordpress.com <http://www.curatingart.wordpress.com/>
Speaker Biographies:
Beatrice von Bismarck is Professor of Art History and Visual Culture at the Academy of Visual Arts Leipzig. Her current research areas include modes of cultural production connecting theory and practice, definitions of artistic work, curatorial practice, effects of neo-liberalism and globalisation on the cultural field and postmodern concepts of the ‘artist’. From 1989 to 1993 she worked at the Städelsches Kunstinstitut und Städtische Galerie in Frankfurt am Main as curator of the Department of 20th-Century Art. From 1993 to 1999 she worked at the University of Lüneburg. Since 2000 von Bismarck has been the Program Director of the Leipzig Academy’s gallery. In the year of its re-opening she conceived a programme of exhibitions and events titled “Grenzbespielungen. Performativität und Übergangszonen” (2001/2002). Contributors included Ursula Biemann, Roger M. Buergel, Harun Farocki, Christian Jankowski, Monika Löw, Gordon Matta-Clark, Angela Melitopoulos, Christian Philipp Müller, Ruth Noack, Walid Ra’ad, Gerald Raunig, Juliane Rebentisch, Oliver Ressler, Irit Rogoff, Martha Rosler and Hito Steyerl. In 2000 she co-founded of the project-space /D/O/C/K-Projektbereich. In Autumn 2009 she initiated the M.A. programme Cultures of the Curatorial.
Nav Haq is Exhibitions Curator at Arnolfini in Bristol, where he has worked on developing the contemporary art programme since early 2008. He curated the 3rd Contour Biennial for Video Art, Belgium, in summer 2007 (www.contour2007.be <http://www.contour2007.be/> ), and was also previously a Guest Editor at BookWorks, London, for whom he commissioned the artists Olivia Plender and Rosalind Nashashibi to produce new artist's books. From 2005-2007 he was the curator at Gasworks in London. Haq is also the co-curator (with Tirdad Zolghadr) of the long-term research project Lapdogs of the Bourgeoisie, investigating the subject of class hegemony in contemporary art. He developed his curatorial approach through professional experiences at organisations including the Whitechapel Gallery, London, and Spike Island, Bristol. Haq has contributed to numerous art magazines including frieze, Keleidoscope and Bidoun, and is one of the Editors of the biannual journal Concept Store published by Arnolfini.
Maria Lind has been Director of the Graduate Program, Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, USA, since 2008 and was the 2009 recipient of the Walter Hopps Award for Curatorial Achievement From 2005 to 2007 she was Director of IASPIS (International Artist Studio Program in Sweden) in Stockholm. From 2002 to 2004 she was Director of Kunstverein München where together with a curatorial team she ran a programme involving artists such as Deimantas Narkevicius, Oda Projesi, Annika Eriksson, Bojan Sarcevic, Philippe Parreno and Marion von Osten. From 1997 to 2001 she was curator at Moderna Museet in Stockholm and, in 1998, co-curator of Manifesta 2, Europe’s biennale of contemporary art. Responsible for Moderna Museet Projekt, Maria worked with artists on a series of 29 commissions realised in a temporary project-space, within or beyond the museum in Stockholm. Among the artists were Koo Jeong-a, Simon Starling, Jason Dodge and Esra Ersen. She also curated What if: Art on the Verge of Architecture and Design, filtered by Liam Gillick, for Moderna Museet as well. Maria has contributed widely to art reviews and periodicals as well as to numerous exhibition catalogues and other publications. She has recently co-edited Curating with Light Luggage and Collected Newsletter (Revolver Archiv für aktuelle Kunst), Taking the Matter into Common Hands: Collaborative Practices in Contemporary Art (Blackdog Publishing) as well as the report European Cultural Policies 2015 (IASPIS and eipcp, Vienna) and The Greenroom: Reconsidering the Documentary and Contemporary Art (Sternberg Press).
Sarah Lowndes is a lecturer, curator and writer based in Glasgow. Lowndes is a lecturer in the Historical and Critical Studies Department at Glasgow School of Art, where her research focuses on artist-led projects, interdisciplinary and performance-related practice and contemporary art. She has contributed to Frieze, the Frieze Yearbook, Artforum, Art on Paper, Untitled, Circa, MAP, 2HB, Spike Art Quarterly and Afterall and to catalogues for international institutions. A revised and expanded second edition of her book Social Sculpture (2004), which documented the Glasgow art and music scene since the 70s, will be published in 2010. She curated Three Blows, a weekend of all-sound acoustic performance by contemporary visual artists and musicians, set in St. Cecilia’s Hall in Edinburgh (2008), co-organised the symposium Subject in Process: Feminism and Art (2009), curated the international group exhibition Votive at CCA, Glasgow (2009) in collaboration with Glasgow Museums and the performance event Urlibido, which highlights stagecraft influences in the work of seven contemporary women artists, for Glasgow International 2010.
Bojana Pejic is a curator and art historian based in Berlin. She received her PhD from Karl von Ossietzky University in Oldenburg, having first studied History of Art at Belgrade University. She was a curator at Belgrade University’s Student Cultural Centre from 1977 to 1991, when she organised many exhibitions of Yugoslav and international art. From 1984 to 1991 she was an editor for the art theory journal Moment in Belgrade. In 1995 she organised the international symposium The Body in Communism at the Literaturhaus in Berlin. She was chief curator of the landmark exhibition After the Wall: Art and Culture in Post-Communist Europe, organised by the Moderna Museet, Stockholm (1999), which toured to the Museum of Contemporary Art Foundation Ludwig in Budapest (2000) and Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin (2000-2001). In 1999 she was one of the co-curators of the exhibition Aspects/Positions at the Museum of Contemporary Art Foundation Ludwig in Vienna. Bojana was chief curator of the October Salon in Belgrade in 2008. She recently curated Gender Check: Femininity and Masculinity in the Art of Eastern Europe, a major group exhibition and research project, showcasing work from 24 post-socialist countries. First hosted by MUMOK Vienna, the exhibition is currently shown at Zacheta National Gallery of Art in Warsaw.
Edinburgh College of Art (eca) is a charity registered in Scotland, number SC009201
