Curated From Within: the Artist as Curator
Artists invented what we now understand as modern curating. The various avant-gardes established types of display that fundamentally changed what was possible in an exhibition context. Their efforts were later echoed by other practices of independent artist-run spaces, also known as “artist-run initiatives,” that drew curating close to interventionist and activist intentions.
Say it Again, KNULP at New Joerg, Vienna
Habitually we assume that what we read and say neatly corresponds with what we see and experience. Language and speech however rarely fully align with what we attempt to express or describe.
Another Place After Another
The exhibition ‘Transplant’ was conceived as a collaboration between the independent artist space KNULP in Sydney and Sydney College of the Arts gallery at the University of Sydney. Part of the underlying though not explicit mandate of the exhibition, was to highlight the seminal role independent art spaces play in the creation and critique of contemporary culture locally and around the world.
From Pillar to Post
This exhibition addressed the unique physical peculiarities of the ageing colonial-era architecture in which it occurred. Its title, ‘Pillar to Post’ suggested the degree to which contemporary life is evermore at the whim of external forces that propel us from one space to another. We move more frequently than ever from one place to another, from one situation to another, willingly or not.
Art and the Politics of Withdrawal
The controversy surrounding founding Biennale of Sydney corporate sponsor Transfield, and its simultaneous operation of refugee detention centres, raises much broader issues. At first glance, could there be anything more diametrically opposed than a multi-national corporation capitalising on human suffering and a mass cultural event implicitly believed to democratically celebrate global difference?
Someone Looks at Something/ with One Eye Close To... Shane Haseman at AFAAAR
References to four key figures of the historical avant-garde - Tristan Tzara, Hugo Ball, Marcel Duchamp and Samuel Beckett - appear in Shane Haseman’s latest work ‘High Street’, at NEAR gallery in Sydney. A series of site-specific intellectual gags suggest alternative understandings of their historical legacies.
Something in the Air: Internet Art as Archive and Strategy Beyond the Gates of the Museum
Internet art’s seeming peripherality to the greater art world is uncanny when the internet has so radically altered the ways in which anyone with access to such technology, views both art and the world generally. Meanwhile, the virtualisation of Capital, labour, art and culture, is far more pervasive, far less obvious and far more insidious than simple ‘VR’ technology would suggest.
Artist Run = Emerging: A Bad Equation
If one were to take seriously the autonomy suggested by the term ‘artist-run’, then the assumed natural dominance and superior expertise of many other professional players in the so-called culture industry, would be called into question.
Out of the Past: Beyond the Four Fundamental Fallacies of Artist Run Initiatives
Over time the role and function of Artist Run Initiatives (ARIs) has shifted from one of quasi-resistance and the questioning of commonly held (essentially commercial) perceptions of contemporary art, to one largely of acquiescence and thoughtless professionalism. Luckily, there are still aberrations and exceptions to this rule.
To produce value under Capital is a misfortune because it means producing value for somebody else.