series of debates

{Curating Institution}

Curating Institution is a public program based on discusions, lectures or seminars. We invited curators as well as directors of major international art institutions. We would like to refers to the strategies, projects and theoretical background which develop critical institution in the global circulation of art.

An idea standing behind Curating Institution is directly coming from the Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art program based on the context of re-thinking the globalization of art, culture and politics, posing a question on a possible role of contemporary art and art institution. Since the end of 2015 our thinking has been very much focused on a critical approach to global art and global processes. We asked questions of materiality and new view on performativity of painting, as well as on complex relations between society and state. We took under consideration the potential and developmnet of independent artist-activist and educational collectives which operate on the peripheries of global circulations. In other case we questioned the post-transformational public spaces in post-Soviet countries. The issue of political, social, economic and cultural transformations and sometimes brutal processes of modernisation in Poland after Communism, was our another approach as we try to build the definition of postcontemporary identity. In such a context, our new project Curating Institution, seems to constitute an important platform of knowledge exchange between art institutions’ directors and curators from all over the world, sharing their practices and theoretical premises with professional and broad public in Poland.

The main question which seems to be most urging is: if and under which conditions is a critical institution of art possible today? By which means should it address and diagnose current changes in global politics and economies, as well as reflect on them? Which is a possible role and a future of contemporary art within such a landscape? We deeply believe in an urgent need of such a discussion as well as in an importance of sharing and exchanging thoughts and experiences between professionals in contemporary art field in a collective effort to rethink it. All the meetings would be archived forming this way a valuable resource of knowledge.

We invited to the program professionals such as: Kęstutis Kuizinas (director of CAC in Vilnus), Barbara Steiner (director of Kunsthaus in Graz), Krist Gruijthuijsen (director of KW Institute for Contemporary Art in Berlin), Bartomeu Mari (director of The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Seoul) and Aya Lurie (director and curator in chief of Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art in Israel).

 

  • Curator
    • Małgorzata Ludwisiak
Support

2017–2019