Talk with Barbara Steiner, head director of Kunsthaus Graz – Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art

Is it possible – and in what conditions – to build a critical institution of contemporary art? How should art institutions undertake diagnoses regarding the globally arising political, social and economic changes? These are the two basic questions posed by the Curating Institution project, developed by the Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art.

These questions were also posed to Barbara Steiner, the head director of Kunsthaus in Graz. Considering the fact that contemporary art functions in the processes of the social economy and that they often determine the principles of participation in artistic circulation, Barbara Steiner draws attention to a significant element, which often disappears from the art institution’s field of view—the sense of community and common good. During the presentation, she will also refer to the subject of the place itself—the exhibiting institution. Using her experience at the Kunsthaus in Graz, she will reflect on the idea of building institutions as places where the public and private space meet.