Journal of Curatorial Studies - Volume 13, Issue 1, 2024

This article discusses the sonic and spatial configurations of the Spiritualist séance as a speculative antecedent to the presence of disembodied voices, such as Amazon’s Alexa, in contemporary homes. I examine archival notes, photographs and audio recordings in order to unpack how séances curated domestic spaces in order to display and interrogate unseen agents. Further, I consider the presentation of the sound installation The Dark Age of Connectionism: Captivity (2017) by Wesley Goatley at IMPAKT festival, curated by the curatorial collective Haunted Machines, as a case study that demonstrates how the exhibition framework articulated in the séance room might be applied as critical strategy in gallery spaces.

Supernatural America: The Paranormal in American Art opened in June 2021, amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and reverberations from racial justice uprisings in 2020. The exhibition took shape over five years, growing and deepening through collaborative practices with several different communities, including Spiritualists. Partnerships with paranormal experiencers and practitioners, as well as sceptics and academics across the humanities, enhanced the exhibition’s curatorial and interpretive framework. Artworks made by trance mediums in ritual settings played a key role in the project and were integrated into a broad context of paranormal visual and material culture. These sacred artefacts, borrowed from Spiritualist camps, had never before left their communities. This curatorial reflection describes the relational approach to curating that prepared me to respond to ethical concerns, informed the interpretive plan and led to a sensitive presentation of this content.

Review of: Juan Muñoz, In the Violet Hour

Curated by Manuel Segade, Centro Dos Mayos, 17 June 2023–7 January 2024 and Sala Alcala 31, 14 February 2023–9 July 2023, Madrid

Review of: Counter Revanchist Art in the Global City: Walls, Blockades and Barricades as Repertoires of Creative Action, Leah Modigliani

New York: Routledge (2024), 202 pp., h/bk,

ISBN: 978-1-032-19511-7, US$180, e-book,

ISBN: 978-1-00325-954-1, US$54.99