Workshop Curating Performance/Performing Curation by OnCurating Academy Berlin
Lecturer: Dr. Sarah Spiess
Course dates: 16.05 + 30.05 2026, 2–6pm (CEST)
Maximum participants: 20
Fee: EUR 250
Enroll here until May 15, 2025
About the course
The rise of performative formats across curated museum, gallery and research programmes demands a more nuanced understanding of the current interchange between performance, performance/live art and contemporary choreographic practice under the ‘new performance turn’. Drawing from the tendencies of curatorial frameworks that have excavated performance and choreographic practice since the early 21st Century – alongside seminal examples from the 1950’s onwards – this online course will focus on the expansive potential of performance as a mode of tactical production and performativity as a method of curatorial exchange.
Course content will highlight critical questions around the potential for performative curatorial activities to critique the systems that govern intimacy, embodiment, mediation, and spectatorship. The course will also provide a range of pertinent examples (both practical and conceptual) to advance more refined subject knowledge. Assignments are designed to support individual insights and future projects.
About the lecturer
Dr Sarah Spiess is a choreographer, independent performance curator and senior lecturer in contemporary dance and performance art. She is part of the curatorial collective Accumulations and has led and collaborated on numerous internationally funded public research and performative programmes. She is the author of Choreographies of the Curatorial: Performative Trajectories for Choreography and Dance in the Museum (2020) and the co-editor of (Un)Commoning Voices & (Non)Communal Bodies (2021) with Maayan Sheleff. She is on the editorial board of TURBA – The Journal for Global Practices in Live Arts Curation.
Preparation for the course:
To ensure a smooth experience, please use a headset (or headphones) and choose a quiet place with a stable internet connection. You will receive access to the required reading materials after booking the course; please review them in advance.
Procedure
This intensive, two-part live course will be conducted via Zoom on two consecutive Saturdays from 2:00 to 6:00 PM CEST. Please prepare a brief introduction of yourself and your projects (3-5 minutes). The first session will focus on an in-depth introduction to the topic and workshop research. Assignments for the second session will be provided at the end of the first session. In the second session, you will receive feedback and evaluations. Upon successful completion, you will be awarded a certificate worth 1 ECTS credit
OnCurating Academy Berlin
The Course is part of the OnCurating Academy Berlin. The OnCurating Academy Berlin provides postgraduate and continuing education in an environment for critical curatorial thinking and new perspectives and formats of curatorial practices. Based on our activities as the OnCurating Journal, we offer an opportunity to deepen and share knowledge and to grow together into a lively community of aspiring curators, artists and art administrators. The programme focuses on cooperative, interdisciplinary working methods, as employed, for example, in film productions or non-government organisations. The CAS in Curating provides opportunities to engage with international institutions, collaborate across disciplines, and explore contemporary curating through a flexible, hybrid format—either remotely or on-site in Berlin at Radialsystem and ZK/U—Center for Art and Urbanistics. Applications open now.
Exhibition-making/curating means the creation of innovative structures for the presentation of cultural artefacts through interdisciplinary collaboration. In this field, art, digital media, design and architecture intermesh in new ways.
OnCurating Academy has offered workshops and symposia with the HEK House of Electronic Arts Basel, documenta fifteen, Taipei Biennale, Bucharest Biennale, ARKO Seoul, Fridericianum Kassel, Kunstmuseum Basel, TBA21, Tai Kwun Museum Hong Kong, KW Berlin, Humboldt University Berlin, Zurich University of the Arts, University of Reading, ICA London, and many more.
Upcoming talks on curatorial practice and theory in Berlin and beyond
On Curating Academy Berlin also hosts a free series of talks on curatorial practice on Fridays from 5–7pm CET in Berlin and on Zoom.
The series brings together key figures from Berlin’s art and discourse infrastructure, including Florian Wüst (artist, film curator, and publisher across major institutions, March 20, 2026, Register here), Mira Anneli Naß (University Stuttgart, March 27, 2026, Register here ), Leon Kahane (artist-researcher on politics, institutions, and border regimes, April 10, 2026, Register here), Hannah Kruse (Goldrausch Künstlerinnenprojekt, April 17, 2026, Register here), Jonas Tinius (Institute of European Ethnology, Humboldt University Berlin, April 24, 2026, Register here), Nabi Nara (SOMA Art Berlin, May 9, 2026, Register here), Solvej Helweg Ovesen (Humboldt Forum , May 15, 2026, Register here) and, Kathleen Reinhardt (Director, Georg Kolbe Museum Berlin; curator of the German Pavilion, Venice Biennale 2026, May 29, 2026, Register here).
Head of the programme: Prof. Dr. Dorothee Richter.
More information about educational programmes: curating.org. For enquiries, please contact info@curating.org. Subscribe to the newsletter for regular updates.
