Journal I Internship @ SAM

Our first internship session was mainly a conversation about the workings of SAM and the issues public institutions face in negotiating the various pressures from other government bodies. It was certainly an insightful dialogue on the role and responsibilities public museums have to both its audience and the ethos of contemporary art. One memorable takeaway for me was that curators of such institutions will have to be flexible in navigating through the various channels and parties that exert some form of power over the institution, but always remain firm in their personal and professional principles- "the core". Some food for thought!

Some thoughts about the readings given:

In a nutshell, Patrick Flores's article attempts to characterise and situate curation in Southeast Asia, while Robert Storr's piece focuses on instructing the curator of art on the dos and don'ts of exhibition making.

One illuminating point brought out by Flores is that the curator of today has to be firmly plugged into the contemporary. Now this begs the question, what is the contemporary? It is something which I find some difficulty in defining perhaps because its parameters are constantly changing, its meaning and interpretation constantly in flux. Flores describes the contemporary system as being created as it is practiced:

...the state of contemporary art is rather fluid, and given the uneven and asymmetrical modes by which modernity had taken root in these art worlds, certain practices and roles are practically makeshift, improvised and run on idiosyncratic rationality; the rules in the field are rather pliant, continuously modified by the practice of curators whose very practice creates a system, which had not existed before their sorties into this arena.

I think this brings some insight to the curator's position in the cultural sphere. We've discussed about the power the curator has in validating art through selecting and articulating. As a result, museums, alternative spaces and independent galleries etc create an ecosystem that generates and regenerates the art world as we see it, and is therefore part of the production of contemporary culture. It reveals to me, then, that the curator doesn't only need to be plugged into the contemporary, but s/he is at the forefront of creating aesthetic standards through interrogating conditions of the contemporary man:

Curation as an inventive mediation that produces exhibitions, events, careers, and values and the curator as an agent who actively selects and represents these within the social world of art becomes a compass that guides us as we navigate the vast realms of what is only vaguely invoked as the contemporary.

In other words, I think one can say that the curator creates the contemporary while being part of it. As a conduit of culture, the curator identifies and presents social notions, and also creates recombinant ways of seeing art and the world.

For Storr, he sharply states that the curator/exhibitioner is not an artist, but is a mediator, an advisor, a channel and a translator of ideas all at once. He strongly stresses the responsibility and obligation the curator has to the artist, the institution and the public. I think Storr refers to the curator largely as the middleman who is required to ensure that exhibitions do what they should with everyone's needs being met.

I think Storr's point that "the most important contract of all exists between the exhibition-maker and the public" is rather important, especially when it involves public institutions. It reminds me of what Flores said in his lecture that the curator is also very much a "patient" to his/her audience, and that the art and the intentions behind its presentation loses value if not rightly communicated. While there is necessity to ensure that shows remain open-ended, the curator ought to bear in mind how it will be received. As put by Storr:

...it is plain both as a practical matter and as a matter of principle that the ultimate decisions are made by the viewer. The job of the exhibition-maker is to do all that can be done so that those decisions will be well informed, rooted in perception and, in a positive sense, inconclusive.

The curator thus has to be sensitive to the tensions that underlie the meaning of their shows, making sure that the audiences remain enthralled and also have the space to conceive their own responses. I believe that is where the challenge for the curator lies.



Stef

Journal I Day 1 Internship with SAM

Reading Material - "PAST PERIPHERY: CURATION IN SEA", Patrick D. Flores

Some thoughts I have in mind wrt this reading that we failed to discuss due to our overflowing dialogue.

1) It is not helpful to divide the 'independent' and 'institutional' curators. Patrick mentioned that curators that move in and out of both respective contexts carve a peculiar space within which they practice curation and break through the membranes of the art world. However in our context, there isnt much opportunities for curators to move in and out of the 'independent' and 'institutions'. It is a said achievement for one to progress from the former to the latter. But I am curious to know what incentives are present for him/her to move the opposite direction?

The exchange of ideas in such a movement combines both of them into a whole sphere of curatorial positions that is independent of institutional politics, notions of authority. This progression has the potential to allow art to manifest itself into a purer and saturated form - one that is true to its form and free from political restrains.


2) The 4 curator tendencies are someone similar to artistic tendencies - Past exotic artscape, renewal of tradition, advocacy, and search for the new. What I like about such similarities is the curatorial community of artists as curators, and curators as artists. Such tendencies serve as a base starting point for a whole progression of ideas and inspiration to be augmented through a conceptual discourse and eventually evolving into a new work(artist) and a new angle or position(curator).


3) The future of curation may move beyond found and intangible spaces. In some situations, curators are actually just asked to write curatorial introductions for a particular collection of ideas or narratives. Their roles will supersede exhibitionary practices while increasingly becoming more sought after in approaching unique angles into ways of seeing things. This is due to the fact that many other current roles of curation has the potential to be 'substituted', but we cant possibly substitute the curators ideas.


Daryl

common programme: Curatorial Roundtable 02

Date: 18 Aug 2012
Time: 2pm
Venue: Unit 15 Lorong 24A Geylang

To RSVP: Please email museum@nus.edu.sg or call 6516 8817 / 8428
Limited to only 30 seats.


::: THE CURATORIAL ROUNDTABLE SERIES

Presented in conjunction with Curating Lab 2012, the Curatorial Roundtable series is a public talk series that gathers together curatorial and industry pratitioners across different spectrums, to discuss their latest exhibitions and projects. Although presented primarily for the participants of Curating Lab 2012, this series is an opportunity to bridge the gap between the curator and the audience, providing opportunities for interaction and stimulating discussions on curatorial practices and process.

::: PANELISTS

David Henkel is Curator for Southeast Asia at the Asian Civilisations Museum (ACM). His focus is primarily on the Malay World and Tribal communities, as well as the early-modern period of Southeast Asian history. His research interests include weapons and warfare, religion and ritual, woodcarving, metalwork and textiles. His most recent exhibition was Land of the Morning: The Philippines and its People. 

Lilian Chee is a writer, architectural theorist and designer. She was trained at the Bartlett, University College London where she obtained her doctorate, and at the National University of Singapore where she is currently Assistant Professor. She is interested in the potentials and problematics of domesticity as it impacts the individual, the neighborhood, and ultimately, the city. Her interest has been explored across various visual media including architecture, art and film. She is presently working on a research film looking at domesticity within Singapore's public housing context.

Erika Tan is an artist and curator whose work has evolved from an interest in anthropology and the moving image. Her work is often informed by specific cultural, geographical or physical contexts; exploring different media to create situations that excite, provoke, question, confront and invite comments from an audience. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally including Thermocline of Art (ZKM, Germany 2007), The Singapore Biennale (2006), Around The World in Eighty Days (South London Gallery / ICA 2007), EAST International  (Norwich Gallery 2000), Cities on the Move (The Hayward Gallery, London), and Incommunicado (Hayward Touring exhibition). 

Journal | Of Authors and Agency in the Museum/Exhibition

By Kenneth Tay

Perhaps it's because I come with the prejudices of being a student of literature, but I think that even as we continue to speak of curatorship as a kind of authorship (I think first mentioned by Ahmad) we need to examine what is meant by the figure of the "author", as well as what are some of its implications for the 'reading' of any (museum) exhibition.

For the convenience of this piece, I'd like to maintain that a curator is or can be an artist insofar as the curated exhibition can be thought of an artwork - a bricolage amalgamated from a selected series of art-works and objects. It is in this sense that I speak of "curator", "artist" and "author" all in one same breath.

Almost predictably, I refer to Barthes' seminal essay "The Death of the Author" (1967) as a starting point for a problematization of the "author" figure. In Barthes' case,

[t]he author is a modern figure, a product of our society insofar as, emerging from the Middle Ages with English empiricism, French rationalism and the personal faith of the Reformation, it discovered the prestige of the individual (emphasis mine)

To that, Barthes speaks of the "Author" as a particular and traditional author that has been normalized perhaps due to certain theological inflections (i.e. the "Author" as the god-creator of his text/work). That is to say that the meaning of the art-work or text resides alone in the 'intention' of its creator and that any reading or interpretation is merely a retrieval and recovery of this meaning: "To give the text an Author is to impose a limit on the text, to furnish it with a final signified, to close the writing" (Barthes). In short, the Author's intention is the only possible line of reading - the alpha and omega of our hermeneutics.

Against the figure of the "Author", I think it prudent for us to remember that the curator should not be seen as a kind of god-creator of his/her exhibition. On this note, I am also certain that in no way was Ahmad trying to suggest this either when he mentioned that curatorship is a form of authorship - well, not this Author-ship anyway.

Even as we continue to read the curator's statement(s) or the captions for the selected works in a particular exhibition, we are not bound to the 'intention' of the curator in our reading/engagement with the exhibition-as-artwork. In other words, the curator-author does not or should not tyrannize our interpretation of his/her exhibition into a single line of thought favored and preselected by him/her.

That being the case, we would be foolish to think of ourselves as free autonomous agents in the space of the museum or exhibition either. The curator does in fact manipulate and limit the possible pathways/vectors of our interpretation through factors as varied as the dramaturgy of the exhibition and the choice of object/works presented. In our role as readers, viewers and recipients of the curator's exhibition-as-artwork, we are never completely free. In short, our hermeneutic horizon has been foreclosed or circumscribed as such by the conscientious selection and deliberation on the part of the curator-author. The curator may not be a coercive "Author" but s/he is not politically innocent either in his/her mobilization of our thoughts. As reading subjects in the museum or exhibition, we are also subjected to the antics of the curator-author (eg. system of representation). In that sense, the idea that we are coming into the space of the museum or the exhibition as an autonomous subject able to hold the 'world' in an anthology of objects and images in front of us is a fantasy we need to be aware of, and that of our 'agency' as reader/viewer be problematized.We can no longer speak of agency purely in the simple formulation of whether we readers or viewers possess it or not, but that this 'agency' always operate in degrees and in shades of grey.

Returning to Barthes' frequently-cited statement "the birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the Author", we ought to remain vigilant to the fact that this birth is not one necessarily free of symbolic chains and that the death of the Author in the museum gives way to the curator-author who, though no longer overdetermines, nonetheless continues to yield a considerable (determining) force on our hearts and heads.

Journal I some arrows are better than others

Undoubtedly, one of the distinctive characteristics about Arrow Factory is its sense of humor.

Whether that's a conscious decision by the curators and/or the artists themselves, it is hard not to attribute it to the nature of the space itself. A small and supposedly unassuming space no more than 15 sqm situated along a small hutong alley in the Beijing city center.

Amongst its many project over the last 5 years, such as the video installation (It’s Not About the Neighbors) by Wang Gongxin that creates a simulacrum of Arrow Factory's neighbor or the kinetic installation (38 Jianchang Hutong) by Zhang Peili, these projects exhibit a particular sense of mischief.

Perhaps, it stems from the fact that it doesn't need to take itself too seriously. As compared to the big institutions, museums and galleries that exist because they have to exist, Arrow Factory seems to exist, simply because it wants to.

Space

Activity for Day 4 of the Curatorial-Intensive: Participants were asked to envision their own spaces with an annual budget of $50,000. They had to select a specific location and conceptualise the programming of the space.

Participants will be posting their concepts in the comments below.

Journal I (museum) space-hopping

hi, it's me rachelle.

today's curriculum was exceptionally interesting because we finally got to talk about the curatorial practice in an actual space - the museum/gallery setting. oh, do not get me wrong, i am not implying that the first 2 days were dull. i do appreciate and enjoy the discussions we've had so far:  curatorial motivations, political implications arising out of these motivations, theoretical/social concerns revolving around exhibiting, curator's responsibilities, etc. i would think these to be very necessary thought processes that drive any good exhibition-making. beyond asking questions and "interrogations", i wonder - as curators, is it not equally important for us to understand the dynamics behind our curatorial concepts/intentions and the act of translating them into a physical space? the naggy bottom-line is that people understand and experience an exhibition by walking through it. the interaction between the viewer and the object/narrative in space cannot be excluded from the curatorial language. if an exhibition fails to communicate spatially (with text or no text), then the entire curatorial storyline collapses alongside it. i guess what i am trying to say is that, without a proper understanding of "site", a curator could sabotage his own efforts.

i am commenting on this as a reaction to today's curatorial tours, and also as an inevitable response from having been trained as an architect and my cursed OCD-ish tendencies towards the physicality of any space.  the 4 places that we visited - NUS museum, SAM, Future Perfect and NMS - all handled their objects/narratives in space very differently, with some more successful than others. i understood these excursions as an activity that is v pertinent in understanding each institution's curatorship. simply because exhibitions are 3-dimensional in nature and should be perceived beyond imagery, text and concepts. reading and looking at Jia Aili's works from a brochure is quite different from witnessing them in real space. i appreciated how david considered the old saint joseph's building structures in his positioning of Jia's paintings. this is the juncture where architecture becomes a curatorial device. which is very exciting for me because i then begin to understand paintings beyond their frames and the idea of site-specificity comes into play. 

this post also seems to respond to one of the 6 modules (sadly not the one i was assigned to) where it discusses the "appropriating of knowledge as a curatorial commonplace" and how "information as a body of knowledges and ideas is synonymous to the internet landscape." my problem with curators not tackling issues of site/locality is that exhibitions produced are often spatially incoherent. and my very gut response is - why bother taking up physical space? why not a virtual museum instead? people remember TATE for both its art and its turbine hall references. and besides, we were all so drawn to the gillman barracks today, albeit sans art! siuli also commented how SAM's acquisition policy was largely based on the assumption that they will at some point move into a bigger space. the notion of site in exhibition-making should be talked about more among curators. the physicality of an exhibition space does determine the curatorial direction in a very real manner. back in school, i was trained to express architectural/political/social concepts and theories using drawings and 3-d models only. and in the words of pauline, "this was the fun part" because we were then forced to think with our hands. hence all these leave me wondering - why do curators talk so little through the arrangement and placement of things? is it not fun for them? so far, it appears only as an after-thought.