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- Volume 2, Issue 1, 2013
Journal of Curatorial Studies - Volume 2, Issue 1, 2013
Volume 2, Issue 1, 2013
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Berlin, Paris, Liverpool: ‘Biennialization’ and Left Critique in 2012
More LessThis article examines three European examples of the ‘biennale’ phenomenon from 2012 in order to explore Charlotte Bydler’s insistence that there is no ‘biennial format’, no single ‘biennial discourse’, and the ‘only way to historicize a biennial is to identify its specificity’. It will argue two main points: first, that instances of ‘specificity’, evident in relationships between artworks and audiences, constituencies and communities, are in tension with curatorial conventions of so-called ‘biennial culture’ and ‘biennialization’; second, that responding to conflicting characteristics of biennales is a challenge to leftists wary and weary of, on the one hand, reductive characterizations – treating instances as homogeneous manifestations of the market – and, on the other, melancholic retreats into claims for the power of aesthetic judgments and experiences as counter to capitalism’s culture of spectacle.
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From the Streets to the Gallery: Exhibiting the Visual Ephemera of AIDS Cultural Activism
By Tara BurkRecent curatorial attention to AIDS cultural activism and its attendant queer and feminist public art practices has highlighted issues surrounding the display of visual ephemera generating questions such as how can materials made for the street be displayed in a gallery setting? What, if any, contextualization is required? How are activist practices transformed when they become materials in an archive? Different curatorial strategies have included the presentation of original posters from the personal archives of activists (ACT UP New York: Activism, Art and the AIDS Crisis 1987–1993, 2009 and 2010) to the reprinting and enlargement of graphic designs originally utilized as posters, billboards and demonstration placards (Gran Fury: Read My Lips, 2012). Each of these exhibitions relied upon an archival aesthetic, but towards different ends: ACT UP New York organized its archive in affective terms, while Gran Fury: Read My Lips created a sociocultural presentation. This article compares these two exhibitions, and the curatorial strategies each devised in order to represent and animate the ephemera of AIDS cultural activism.
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Towards an Intimate Democracy in Europe: Paweł Leszkowicz’s Queer Curating
By Jon DaviesThis interview with Polish curator and scholar Paweł Leszkowicz discusses queer curatorial practice and the rapidly changing landscape for sexual politics and queer artmaking in Central and Eastern Europe. Focusing on his landmark exhibition Ars Homo Erotica (2010), Leszkowicz outlines how it traced themes of homoerotic desire and transgender identity through the collection of the Polish National Museum, and juxtaposed historical pieces with queer work by contemporary Central and Eastern European artists. The interview also considers the dynamic relationship between queer curatorial practice and its distinctive local and national contexts around the globe.
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The Archive in Exhibition Making: Material, Concept and Strategy
By Xiaoyu WengThis article explores the creative use of the archive as material, concept and strategy in recent curatorial experiments: Harrell Fletcher’s The American War (2005–2007), Jens Hoffmann’s trilogy exhibitions (2008–2010), and Massimiliano Gioni’s 10,000 Lives (2010). Through the unconventional use of curatorial methods that emphasize materiality and spatial interaction, that mix artworks and documents, and include ephemeral and vernacular artifacts, these exhibitions activate rich social, political and theoretical links.
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Beyond Documentation: The Exhibition Photography of Shunk-Kender and Balthasar Burkhard
More LessThe ephemeral, site-specific, installation-based and performative artworks of the 1960s and 1970s relied heavily on documentation. Likewise, exhibitions depended on photographs like never before, engendering new modes of collaboration between curator and photographer. The advent of the curator-auteur created new opportunities, not only for the camera’s use in making and documenting art, but also for distribution and promotion. During the late 1960s and early 1970s, photographers Balthasar Burkhard and the duo of Harry Shunk and Janos Kender documented exhibitions – both in process and after completion – and created a body of work that could be said to exemplify the nascent genre of ‘exhibition photography’.
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EXHIBITION REVIEWS
Authors: Abigail Susik, Caoimhe Morgan-Feir and Mary L. CoynedOCUMENTA (13) Curated by Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev and associated curatorial agents, various locations, Kassel, Germany, 9 June–16 September 2012
RASHID JOHNSON: MESSAGE TO OUR FOLKS Curated by Julie Rodrigues Widholm, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, 14 April–15 August 2012
WHEN ATTITUDES BECAME FORM BECOME ATTITUDES Curated by Jens Hoffmann, California College of the Arts, Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts, San Francisco, 13 September– 1 December 2012
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BOOK REVIEWS
Authors: Ryan Whyte and Ellyn WalkerSLAVERY AND THE CULTURE OF TASTE, SIMON GIKANDI Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press (2011), 370 pp., Hardcover, ISBN: 978-0-691-14066-7, US$45.00
FROM SITE TO VISION: THE WOMAN’S BUILDING IN CONTEMPORARY CULTURE, SONDRA HALE AND TERRY WOLVERTON (EDS) Los Angeles: Ben Maltz Gallery, Otis College of Art and Design, and the Woman’s Building (2011), 420 pp., Paperback, ISBN: 978-0-930209-23-0
DOIN’ IT IN PUBLIC: FEMINISM AND ART AT THE WOMAN’S BUILDING, MEG LINTON AND SUE MABERRY (EDS) Los Angeles: Ben Maltz Gallery, Otis College of Art and Design (2011), 192 pp., Paperback, ISBN: 978-0-930209-22-3, $55.00 (combined)
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CONFERENCE REVIEWS
Authors: Nicola Ashmore and Alessandra VaccariCULTURES OF CURATING: CURATORIAL PRACTICES AND THE PRODUCTION OF MEANING 1650–2000 The Museums and Galleries History Group Conference, organized by Kate Hill, University of Lincoln, UK, 12–13 July 2012
DIANA VREELAND AFTER DIANA VREELAND Exhibition curated by Judith Clark and Maria Luisa Frisa, Palazzo Fortuny, Venice, 10 March–25 June 2012
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