International Symposium

Curatorial Practices Reframed: 

Politics and Pedagogy in Curating Contemporary Art

November 1-2, 2013| Nicosia, Cyprus

www.oncurating.com

Since the late 1960s the curator’s role has gained increased significance in the selection and presentation of art, charting out a new territory on the aesthetic and cultural frontier. However, the curator’s authoritarian voice and biased choices, as much as any art institutions’ didacticism and fetishization of the art object, have been called to question as the result of postmodern and post-colonial theories. Beyond such theoretical demands, curators have also been forced to re-examine and re-evaluate their practices due to pragmatic difficulties imposed by the nature of the media that contemporary artists are adopting and which challenge both the traditional exhibition space and audience engagement. More so, curators are confronted with new restrains due to the economic crisis. Responding to such challenges, a so-called “educational turn” has been taking effect and exhibitions are gradually de-centralized through the adoption of pedagogical modes of cultural production, such as workshops, seminars, laboratories, or temporary schools, while various rituals of pedagogy have been appropriated in socially engaged exhibitions. This two-day symposium aims to bring together curators, museum professionals, artists and academics, in order to examine the complexities of curatorial practices within the current socio-political and economic landscape, and to investigate curating’s political potential as a new radical trend of critical cultural production and pedagogy. 

Deadline for Registration: September 15, 2013 

(at www.oncurating.com)

The symposium is free and is organized by the Department of Arts of European University Cyprus in collaboration with the Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre, associated with the Pierides Foundation and it is part of the research project “The political potential of curatorial practices and educational paradigms” funded by the Internal Research Grant Scheme of European University Cyprus (Principal Investigator: Dr Elena Stylianou).