Seminar 6: 20^th and 21^st April 2017

The next session will take place in Eindhoven where we will focus on the Caucus project. As we discussed in Mechelen the framework of our intervention in the caucus will be around the collective meal that is taking place each evening at the caucus. A number of you have sent proposals for projects that use this moment - its sociability, architecture and choreography. The curatorial group we formed in Mechelen will discuss the proposal in advance of us meeting next week. We will also visit the location where the evening programme will take place and meet with Van Abbemuseum technicians and staff to plan production. 

Seminar 5: 9^th and 10^th March  2017

The two days in Mechelen will be focused on developing our project for the Van Abbe caucus. We will present our research and start to structure things for May. Look forward to seeing you there!

Seminar 4: 9^th and 10^th February 2017

Exhibition Histories: Cultural Anthropophagy

24th Bienal de São Paulo and Fred Wilson's Mining the Museum. 

This session takes two exhibitions as starting points to discuss context-specific exhibition making and exhibition practice in the context of an increasingly globalised art field: the 24th Bienal de São Paulo and Fred Wilson's Mining the Museum. The 24th Bienal’s use of the Brazilian notion of anthropophagy, or cannibalism, formed the basis for its display strategies within the space of the exhibition, as well as proposing a fundamental rethinking of cultural difference and action in the post-colonial era. The Bienal’s commitment to education in its local context will also provide impetus for reflection on the social role of the globalised art institution. Fred Wilson's installation-exhibition Mining the Museum turned the permanent collection of the Maryland Historical Society against itself, engaging the museum as a site of ongoing colonial relationships, and proposing a critique and counter-history of the practices and histories that underwrite the modern museum. 

Texts:

- Oswald de Andrade, ‘Anthropophagite Manifesto’ (1928), available online in various translations, e.g.: http://www.391.org/manifestos/1928-anthropophagite-manifesto-oswald-de-andrade.html

- Lisette Lagnado ‘Anthropophagy as Cultural Strategy: The 24th Bienal de São Paulo’, in Cultural Anthropophagy: The 24th Bienal de São Paulo 1998, London: Afterall Books, 2015.

- Walter Mignolo 'Museums in the Colonial Horizon of Modernity: Fred Wilson's Mining the Museum (1992)', in Doro Globus (ed.), Fred Wilson: A Critical Reader, London: Ridinghouse, 2011.

Dialogues in Practice: Charl Landvreugd

In the third of the Dialogues in practice sessions we will be joined by artist, curator and researcher Charl Landvreugd. In his presentation Charl will explore the notion of Afropea. Dutch artists of the African diaspora, such as Landvreugd, are producing works shaped by different cultural heritages and media cultures. Their creative explorations have resulted in new subjectivities that are diasporic and belong to a wider transatlantic Afro community and yet, at the same time, have a direct bearing on the Netherlands. The changing nature of cultural difference implied in such a process constitutes a field of conceptualisation that may be described under the provisional heading of ‘Afropea’.-

Reading: Charl Langdrvreud, Notes on Imagining Afropea, Open Arts Journal, Issue 5, July 2016

Caucus session: Friday

On Friday we will continue our discussions regarding the caucus with me and Annie.

All the readings are on the Dropbox. Look forward to seeing you next week,

Nick

Seminar 3: 12^th and 13^th January 2017

Art as Social Intervention

With Nick Aikens, Annie Fletcher, Yaiza Hernandez and Apolonija Sustersic

And so 2017 begins ... 

Exhibition Histories: 

On Exhibitions as Social Intervention

Following on from the previous session with Dr. Lucy Steeds, the second exhibition histories seminar will be with Yaiza Hernandez, will explore the long history of thinking about exhibitions as events with the potential to intervene directly in wider processes of social transformation. Focusing on those exhibitions that have internalised this social function––as opposed to those that have simply showcased ‘socially engaged’ works––we will explore how this impulse partly overlaps with the legacy of ‘community arts’ and ‘inclusive’ cultural policies on the one hand, and on the other, with self-organised political and activist practices. We will pay particular attention to two specific cases that could be seen to stand at opposite ends of the spectrum: Mary Jane Jacob’s exhibition Culture in Action at Sculpture Chicago (1993) and the collectively organised Las Agencias at MACBA, Barcelona (2001).

Dialogues with Practice: Apolonija Sustersic

In the evening we will be joined by the Apolonija Sustersic - in the second of the 'Dialogues in practice' sessions. Sustersic work traverses architecture, art, urban planning in what will form a very interesting counterpart to the Exhibition Histories session and as a connection to the possibilities for what we might do in Eindhoven. Šušteršič is an architect and visual artist. Her work is related to a critical analysis of space; usually focused at the processes and relationships between institutions, cultural politics, urban planning and architecture. Her broad – ranging interest starts at phenomenological study of space and continues its investigation into social and political nature of our living environment.

Caucus session

Following our discussions last time - we will use the Friday morning session to discuss initial ideas and proposals for the caucus. Please bring material, images, ideas you would like to discuss. This session is for us to talk and propose so it is important you come with material. Nick and Annie will also update you on the thematic and content developments of the caucus.

All the readings for the exhibition histories and dialogues with practice sessions are on the Dropbox. 

We meet at the DAI, 2pm sharp on Thursday, see you there. 

Seminar 2:  8^th and 9^th December 2016

Eindhoven

Making Art Global? 

Exhibition Histories: 1989

In the first of our three exhibition histories seminars with Lucy Steeds we will reflect on three exhibitions from 1989 that each deviated from the insularity of contemporary art as understood in Western Europe and North America at the time: ‘Magiciens de la Terre’, Paris, which was audaciously billed as ‘the first worldwide exhibition of contemporary art’; the third Bienal de La Habana, which took place in the Cuban capital with a core show entitled ‘Tres Mundos’ (‘Three Worlds’); and ‘The Other Story: Afro-Asian Artists in Post-War Britain', which was curated in London by the artist Rasheed Araeen (who also took part in ‘Magiciens’). 

Texts by Rasheed Araeen, Charles Esche and Jean Fisher are on the Dropbox  

Dialogues with Practice: Rasheed Araeen

I am delighted we will be joined by artist, writer and editor Rasheed Araeen. Whether as a pioneer of minimalist sculpture, a searing advocate of anti-colonial positions put forward in Black Phoenix (co-founded by Araeen in 1978-79) and later Third Text (founded by Araeen in 1987), as curator of the landmark exhibition ‘The Other Story: Afro- Asian Artists in Post-War Britain’ (Hayward Gallery, London 1989) or through his recent abstract paintings that draw from the Abbasid period, (the golden age of Arab / Muslim civilization 800-1200), Araeen has consistently sought to realign our understanding of modernism – in both its concepts and chronology – imposed by the hegemonic discourses of the west. Araeen will present his practice over the past 60 years, through the framework of his forthcoming retrospective at the Van Abbe. 

Caucus Session: 

We will continue our discussions on the caucus with myself and Annie Fletcher. 

Reading: We have uploaded a series of texts connected to the Be[com]ing Dutch caucus and 2017. 

We will also try and squeeze in time to see the current exhibition 'Positions' with projects by Rosella Biscotto, Duncan Campbell, Mayrjam Jafri and Natasja Kensmil at the Van Abbe and have a stroll around the city. 

*Meet at 11:00 am in the museum cafe. 

Seminar 1: Thursday October 20^th 2016

Eindhoven 

ART AND SOCIAL CHANGE 

The seminar will be led by Nick Aikens (curator, Van Abbemuseum), Will Bradley (artistic director, Kunsthall Oslo), Charles Esche (director, Van Abbemuseum) and Annie Fletcher (chief curator, Van Abbemuseum).

The title of the seminar borrows its name from the eponymous publication, edited by Bradley and Esche (Tate, Afterall, 2007). In the seminar we will begin by outlining the structure of the course for the year ahead. We will then use Art and Social Change for a framework to introduce some key concept and histories. Central to the discussion, as the title suggests, is understanding the entangled relationship between artistic practice and political positions and how this has been articulated at different moments and from different contexts. How has art - or artistic thinking - been deployed to challenge the perceived status quo and put forward a new political imaginary?   

The seminar will focus on four texts / discussions (as well as Will's introduction) which span the 19th century to today:

William Morris, 'The Socialist Ideal: Art'

Varvara Stepanova, 'A General Theory of Consturctivism'  

Emory Douglas, 'Art for the People's Sake'  

Stephan Dillemuth, Anthony Davies and Jakob Jakobsen, 'There is No Alternative: The Future is Self-Organised' 

In the evening session we will visit some of the display and works in the museum, dividing into groups to look at specific presentations in relation to some of the ideas we have been discussing. 

Seminar 1, continuation: Friday October 21^st 2016

Eindhoven 

On Friday morning we will begin at 09:00hrs at the museum and do a 2-hour session with Annie Fletcher and Nick Aikens. Annie and Nick will introduce some of the ideas and structure of the caucus, which will take place in May 2017 and for which the Deviant Practice course will contribute. Students will then leave for Arnhem to get there in time for lunch.