A passer-by looks at one of 100 monuments to Chicago women as part of Suzanne Lacy’s work Full Circle for “Culture in Action” (1993). By honoring women who contributed to the social fabric of the city the project combatted the overrepresentation of men in public space. Courtesy of Sculpture Center.
CuratorLab 2020/2021 Final online Programme. The events are in English and will be livestreamed on CuratorLab Facebook page.
Presented by Anna Mikaela Ekstrand, Giulia Floris, Edy Fung, Julius Lehmann, Marc Navarro, Simina Neagu, Hanna Nordell, Tomek Pawłowski-Jarmołajew, Marja Rautaharju and Erik Sandberg.
26 May, 18:00-19:30
Assuming Asymmetries. Conversations on Curating Public Art Projects of the 1980s and 1990s.
Moderated by Joanna Warsza.
Livestreamed on CuratorLab Facebook page, www.facebook.com/CuratorLab/
27 May, 18:00-19:30
Archeology of a Profession in Sweden. Curating Beyond the Mainstream with Carlos Capelán, Elisabet Haglund, Gunilla Lundahl, and Jan-Erik Lundström.
Moderated by Maria Lind.
Livestreamed on CuratorLab Facebook page, www.facebook.com/CuratorLab/
Curatorial assistant: Vasco Forconi
During this complicated academic year, marked by the pandemic, CuratorLab has dealt with the archeology of the field of curating and its blind spots. Looking, talking, interviewing, analysing and sharing the legacy of some under-researched practitioners and projects was at the core of the course. The many live encounters, archival visits, and even more Zoom interviews, led to two sibling books, Archeologies of a Profession, co-published by Konstfack Collection and Sternberg Press in collaboration with MIT Press, planned for 2021.
The first publication led by Maria Lind and entitled "Archeology of a Profession in Sweden. Curating Beyond the Mainstream" is based on meetings and interviews with curators and institutional directors such as Elisabet Haglund (Kulturhuset in Stockholm and Borås Konstmuseum), Gunilla Lundahl (Independent Projects), Jan-Erik Lundström (Fotografiska Museet and Bildmuseet in Umeå) and Carlos Capelán (Artist as Curator), as well as archival research connected to their work.
The second one, led by Joanna Warsza under the title "Assuming Asymmetries" focused on questions like: How to work culturally and ethically with the asymmetries?; how can artworks create meaning from the place where they are produced?; how have the notions of situated or embedded knowledge changed over the years?; what were the early attempts at de-monumentalising art outside of the museum? The focus was on exhibitions and projects like Culture in Action curated by Mary Jane Jacob in Chicago in 1993; Sonsbeek 93 curated by Valerie Smith; Endlichkeit der Freiheit, an exhibition initiated by Heiner Müller and Rebecca Horn on both sides of the Berlin wall and realised after it had fallen down; Construction in Process, an artist-initiated site-specific exhibition in Łódz in the early ‘80s, Five Gardens curated by Carlos Capelán in 1996 in Simrishamn and Ystad, INSITE in San Diego and Tijuana, the Skulptur Projekte Münster, Galerie des Locataires, and U-media curated by VAVD Editions (Peter Andersson and Måns Wrange in collaboration with Lars Ahlström and Hans Anders Molin) in Umeå in 1987.