By Daryl Goh
It is a common practice that artists collaborate with other artists to create ideas and art works. Increasingly, such approaches are deployed between artists and curators. The exhibition produced out of such contexts can sometimes be regarded as art works. It is not uncommon for artists to be curators, and curators to be artists. Explore the notions of a ‘curatorial community’. (6 Modules)
The fast-expanding role of a curator should be in
consideration with the potential overlaps, complements, and contrasts with the
role of an artist. Curators are becoming more involved in the production of
meaning and the craft of curating has been increasingly read through the
notions of artistry and creativity. The functions, roles, positions and
influence that they exert has changed and created a new form of relationship
between the general audience, the artists, and the art institution. Art critic
and curator, Michael Brenson reflects these changes in an interesting way. He
posits the following as key characteristics of a contemporary curator:
diplomat, economist, aesthetician, critic, politician, audience developer, historian
and marketer. Concurrently, artistic practices have expanded past the
boundaries of the production of objects, and have incorporated other practices
of collaborating, editing and interpreting. Some of them associate directly
with the curator. Such expansion of roles has led to the blurring of lines
between the artists and the curator, and the formation of the role, the
“artist/curator”.
The term “artist/curator” is employed to describe artists
who curate. This function may be purely pragmatic for instance, if there is no
one else to do the job, or if they perceive a significant gap in the work being
presented and exhibited by other curators and institutions. Paul Couillard of
Curators in Context, suggest that “It is important to remember that there has
always been curating done by artist – and there are many models whereby artists
have taken responsibility for the exhibition and dissemination of their work”.
In fact, this practice goes way back to 1648 in France where a group of court
artists sent a petition to King Louis XIV to request the establishment of a
Royal Academy of Painting, which would distinguish their work from the artisan
trades. To make their case, they exhibited a grand display of works that
glorified the monarch and demonstrated that painting was dedicated to the
pursuit of virtue. The Academie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture was
eventually secured alongside academies in Holland, England and Italy. With it,
the status of the new academic artist as a professional came with a big distinction
from the guilded tradesman. It is not a coincidence that such practices
announce a time where art and its relations to criticism and curation were undergoing
intense professionalism. Manifestations of the artist as curator are connected
to moments where they took it upon themselves to reform the socially decreed
politics regarding their profession, thereby redefining the cultural status of
works of art.
On the other hand, the term “curator/artist”, works within a
different set of circumstances. As the role of the curator shifts towards
further participation in the production of meaning, curatorial work could be
justified as creative or artistic in ways that would have been difficult to
conceive of in its more conventional and custodial state. The increased
potential for creativity led to the rise of what could be described as the
‘auteur curator’. This model of curatorial function positions the curator as a
visionary, with the exhibition as his medium of communication. The curator/artist
usually works independently rather than within an institution or organization.
Such a curatorial role has often been the target of criticism, particularly in
terms of subsuming the artists and works within his vision. Harald Szeemann,
the curator of Documenta 5 in 1972, is perhaps the typical auteur curator.
In his essay included Jens Hoffmann’s 1993 project “The Next
Documenta Should be Curated by an Artist”, John Baldessari writes that
“Curators seemingly want to be artists. Architects want to be artists. I don’t
know if this is an unhealthy trend or not. What disturbs me is a growing
tendency for artists to be used as art materials, like paint, canvas, etc. I am
uneasy about being used as an ingredient for an exhibition recipe, i.e., to
illustrate a curator’s thesis. A logical extreme of this point of view would be
for me to be included in an exhibition entitled ‘Artists Over 6 Feet 6 Inches’,
since I am 6’7”. Does this have anything to do with the work I do? It’s
sandpapering the edges off the art to make it fit a recipe”. The fear about
this notion of the curator as an artists is echoed by curator Robert Storr as
he expresses his refusal to call curating a medium since it ‘automatically
conceded the point to those who will elevate curators to the status critics
have achieved through the “auteurization” process’. Storr also situates the
origins of the idea of the curator as artist in Oscar Wilde’s 1890 essay “The
Critic as Artist” which theorized the eye of the beholder producing the work of
art. Storr concludes, “No I do not think that curators are artists. And if they
insist, then they will ultimately be judged bad curators as well as bad
artists”. This ends up reiterating the divide between artist and curator that
inadvertently returns the power of judgment to the critic. Despite this negativity,
we can look at the “curator/artist” with a more positive glance. The
“curator/artist” model might be a means of identification or style of practice,
and a way to articulate and define one’s own practice on personal terms.
It is also often suggested that the contemporary curator
does not occupy a fixed authorial position but rather, constantly shift in
relation to artists, artworks, and institutions. It is clear that the curator’s
role cannot be considered as a static set of actions or decisions, but rather,
a dynamic and fluid process that constantly shifts and evolves in response to
dialogues, conflicts and collaborations. Curated exhibitions were likened to Marcel
Duchamp’s Readymade Aided’ artworks, where the display or exhibition is aided
by the curator’s ‘manipulation of the environment, the lighting, the labels,
the placement of other works of art’. The role of the curator has come to
occupy a deliberately less academic stance, often embodying a more
participatory or hands-on function. The contemporary curator is sometimes a
radically secularized artist. He is an artist because he does everything
artists do. But he is an artist who has lost the artist’s aura, one who no
longer has magical powers at his disposal, who cannot endow objects with art’s
status. He does not use objects but rather abuses them and makes them profane.
This makes the figure of the contemporary curator attractive and so essential
in today’s artistic landscape. As such, curators are no longer limited to being
critical observers but are increasingly understood as instigators, subjective
participants actively defining or redefining art and culture. It may be tough
to give a concrete definition to the curator. However, its role is simply – to
respond to what artists propose.
An issue that comes into place is regarding the artist as a
curator, exhibiting his own work. Is this a good practice? Firstly, artist as
curator brings a fresh eye with new and unexpected choices. A basic argument is
that if his work fit the standard of the exhibition, all is well. The question
is not so much of why they should not include themselves, but why should they?
Regardless of whether the work fits the standards of the show, its inclusion
comes across on the ground viewer as self-serving. It is difficult to see how
this type of show helps in the artist’s career. If they list on their resume
that they exhibited their work with an impressive line up of artists, they
would have to mention their part in selecting them as well. If they omit the
latter, it comes across as ethical violation.
Many believe that artists have increasingly become puppets
to fill the shoes of the curator. Some regard the curation of a large exhibition
as mainly a large marketing tool for the art world without having anything to
do with art. While exhibitions are also markets for the exchange of ideas, art
still has a purpose to remodel and represent the world. In the end it seems to
be an unbeatable system, and in some ways the exhibition is still an
interesting and fluid medium. Who should curate it then? An artist, a curator,
a carpenter? Just as long as the person has a vision, social and organizational
skills, the result will be hated and also loved. No matter how the curators for
shows are chosen, or what profession they come from, it is important that the
curator is, at the end of the day, only a ‘partner in crime’ alongside the
artists. He should be respectful of the creative autonomy and expectations of
the artist. The job of curating becomes a sophisticated form of an intellectual
discourse that sometimes positions itself on parallel to that of an artist. The
challenge is to creatively negotiate a balance between the desire for critical
and artistic authorship, the needs of the artists, and the struggle to develop
new avenues and audiences.
