The Curator, Globalisation and Politics

A recently noted Curator has, naturally enough, sought to position his chosen artists towards the issue of economic globalisation, that is for them to address the economic imbalances making of China the present worksop of consumerism. Laudable as is the attention we should give to the fact of this new situation, that it be addressed through creative visualisation, rather than documentary photography, is perhaps grist to this page's milling of Curatorial practise. Modern art's abandonment into what was initially called the 'perimee' or 'out of date' syndrome, making of all art but a progression rather than a constancy, supposedly based even in its origin as far back as the Renaissance, took full hold only in modern times, roughly speaking after WWI. Therefrom the intitial criticism of this syndrome equally qualified its practise as that of 'postage-stamp' museum collections, based exclusively on time-stamp and novelty rather than any spiritual evaluation. The informality of the words belies the important effect.

Now we see quite rampant desire to initiate the novelty from without, driving artists, who, as ever, include many who are sensible of the forces of fashion, towards commissioned novelty. The Curator's pre-defined analyses lead the actual manufacture of artist response, and the Curator becomes 'super-artist' in a marvellous manner, directing a symphony of creators who are eager to dance to the tune. In the following words can be seen the ad-lib description of the Curator's position. The informality of the words belies the important effect:

"I have never worked in an institution in the past. I have been collaborating with, working with different institutions. It is the first time I have had a regular job, in one place. And that actually gives me an opportunity to do different things, to construct an ongoing program in one place, over time. It gives me an opportunity to fill a real intellectual need. To develop a long-term project. It is something very different than what I’ve done. What I did before was a kind of punctual kind of response to an urgent situation. And now, I have to think about more like a prediction of what’s going on, what’s to come.

"Like projecting certain perspectives.

"An exhibition is a kind of articulate moment of an ongoing creation, of the artist, of the different people. And it’s also a place that can allow different individual creators to come together, to come up with a moment of sharing, dialogue, looking, and creating something together.

"in a lot of cases artists have specific works, or projects, that you bring to a specific exhibition

"you borrow the exhibition, actually the works from the exhibition, if you get it from somewhere else, and you re-contextualize it.

"allows the work to obtain new senses, new meanings, and new significance

"we need exhibitions in society. Right? Because, that is a moment you create, a platform for a dialogue. It’s not only just to show the achievement of the artist.

"to re-articulate through the exhibition.

"He came here to visit, we had a dialogue, after a few days, he came up with an idea, and that remains.

"it’s not only the artwork in it, it’s the space itself. How I use the architecture itself.

"We agreed on this grey paint, which is like a dialogue with the original building — and a new intervention — and that goes on. And we add on different colors

"it’s really about articulating the uniqueness of each locality, as a part of participating in the global movement.

"this [art object] tells one story — only. I think they are together. Every world in itself has little worlds, each with its own complexity, its own history. And they can also get into a dialogue; they can merge with other worlds, generating a totally different geo-political situation. And since we are all living in this geo-political world at large, naturally they [these worlds] can be in contact.

"Even when you are working with very, very, individual, very eccentric artists who are completely isolated from the world, — some of them right? — You have to look at their rejection. As a position taken.

"I hope the exhibitions I have done can provide people the opportunity to question what “art” practice is, and to challenge themselves, and challenge the notion of art.

"I hope an exhibition can allow us to deny certain things usually considered established. Including the notion of art itself, the concept of art itself.

"I think it is very important that we constantly try to put things upside down, and see how it happens.

"In fact when you look at the art, how every major abstract movement happened, in the context, they are totally related to the political and social history. And it’s highly ideological. Like the Greenberg discourses, they are totally a product of the Cold War.


"What’s interesting to me is that historically there was a lot of hostility to abstraction, from both the right and the left, and it was basically Meyer Shapiro who came out in support of abstraction, based on an argument for pleasure.

"But I don’t think you get an argument of pleasure with Greenberg, it’s actually the opposite. It’s like a Protestant rigor, self- censorship.