2013 Curatorial Symposium
ST PAUL St Gallery is pleased to announce its 2013 Curatorial Symposium on 7–9 August 2013. This year’s Symposium will begin with a keynote address by Jens Hoffmann taking place on the evening of 7 August 2013, and the main symposium discussions and presentations will happen over the following two days. The Symposium is free to attend upon registration.
The Symposium is divided into two sections. Through a series of papers and discussions, the first section will examine exhibition histories from the Asia Pacific region as part of the project “From a history of exhibitions towards a future of exhibition making,” initiated by Biljana Ciric. The second section will be dedicated to roundtable discussions and presentations in response to contemporary curatorial concerns as well as reflecting on the context of The 5th Auckland Triennial, If you were to live here…. The ST PAUL St Gallery 2013 Curatorial Symposium is decidedly local and consciously positioned within the geo-political situation of the Asia Pacific.
“From a history of exhibitions towards a future of exhibition making” is a platform of three seminars initiated and organised by Biljana Ciric. The platforms propose to revisit the importance of the exhibition, addressing the situation that beyond the art works themselves, the exhibition is a key factor in relating art to its wider social context. The seminars, stretching across New Zealand, Singapore and China (of which the ST PAUL St Gallery 2013 Curatorial Symposium acts as the first one) will look specifically at the history of exhibitions in China, South East Asia, Australia and New Zealand. This will be done through a series of case studies examining how the exhibition as a form and medium determines our understanding of art practice and how exhibitions as a medium are read in different social and cultural contexts.
How do we attempt to create a cohesive archive and conversation amongst these disparate but overlapping contexts? There is a desire to focus on what it means to make and historicise exhibitions in the Asia Pacific that does not just return to the conventional centres and models of understanding art history. What are the points and measures of reference without referring back to a fixed and dominant centre? Addressing this geo-political area might provide a new approach to art historical mapping and methodologies as well as provide an anchor for comparative research. This research will address the development of contemporary art exhibitions in the region, its relation to curatorial and artistic engagement in the chosen locality, and the global context of exhibition making practices.
The second part of the Symposium will look more towards present curatorial practice reflecting on current concerns as well as imagining an ideal future. Made up of condensed roundtable discussions with curators, artists and writers responding to provocations, the discussions aim to extrapolate the various positions around curatorial practice today.
The Symposium convened by Vera Mey includes speakers Karl Chitham, Natasha Conland, Biljana Ciric, Lauren Cornell, Sarah Farrar, Patrick D. Flores, Rosemary Forde, Jens Hoffmann, Charlotte Huddleston, Reuben Keehan, Caterina Riva, Daniel Satele, Seng Yu Jin, Simon Soon, Taarati Taiaroa, Tran Luong, Luke Willis Thompson, and others to be announced.
For more information please contact Vera Mey, T (+64 9) 921 9515 or vera.mey@aut.ac.nz.
School of Art and Design
AUT University City Campus
Level 1 WM Building
40 St Paul Street
Auckland
Aotearoa/New Zealand
