Pan-European Encounters (ICF Inaugural Symposium)
Dates:
7 Jun 2007 - 10 Jun 2007
People:
Terry Adams, David Adjaye, John Akomfrah, Jonah Albert, Adelaide Bannerman, Chris Burton, Alicia Campbell, Yasmin Canvin, Hilary Carty, Gus Casely-Hayford, Paul Domela, Lina Džuverović, Tim Eastop, Ekow Eshun, Kodwo Eshun, Michael Forbes, Cheryl Gallagher, Thelma Golden, Simon Grosspietsch, Gina Ha-Gorlin, Qian Jing, Harjeet Kaur, Esen Kaya, Melanie Keen, Shama Khanna, Atsuko Kikuchi, Yu Yeon Kim, Sally Lai, Axel Lapp, Sook-Kyung Lee, Kwong Lee, Melanie Lenz, Cedar Lewisohn, Catherine Lucktaylor, Courtney J Martin, Eva McGovern, Syra Miah, Yvette Mutumba, Simon Njami, Joanne Peters, Paul Purgas, Juan Sebastian Ramirez, Jacques Rancière, Sara Raza, Anjalika Sagar, Sherman Mern Tat Sam, Edgar Schmitz, John Sealey, Zineb Sedira, Samenua Sesher, Shamita Sharmacharja, Mariam Sharp, Deborah Smith, Deborah Smith, Robert Storr, Ellie Stout, Claire Summerfield, Gilane Tawadros, Mark Waugh, Julia Waugh, Tania Wilmer, Jen Wu. View 57 more
Location:
Venice
This is the first major gathering of international curators, writers, artists and critics at the Venice Biennale to discuss and explore the changing idea of identity and the diaspora in the 21st century.
The symposium will provide a necessary platform for a critical discussion about the changing nature of representation within an increasingly globalised cultural context. It will pose essential questions about the economies of exhibition, urbanisation and regeneration. It will also consider the international infra-structural developments necessary to nurture and sustain a more representative and culturally diverse professional ecology for the visual arts.
Its point of departure is an essay by Jacques Derrida on the future after Apartheid, and asks: Where are we now? What spectres haunt this scene in the year that South Africa exhibits, for the first time, as guests in the Italian Pavilion and Britain celebrates the 200th anniversary of the Abolition of Slavery Act?
‘Nothing is delivered here in the present, nothing that would be presentable – only, in tomorrow’s rear view mirror, the late, ultimate racism, the last of many.’ – Jacques Derrida 1983: Racism’s Last Word
PROGRAMME
Day one, Thursday 7 June
Pan-European Encounters
Welcome from Symposium sponsors, Samenua Sesher Director decibel, Hilary Carty, Director Cultural Leadership
Prologue: Marco De Michelis (Dean of the University of Venice for the Arts)
Keynote: The International Curators Forum – A 21st Century Renaissance Moment, David A. Bailey (Curator)
Panel discussion: A Black Aesthetic
Chair: Mike Philips (Independent Curator and Cross-cultural Consultant to Tate Britain), Deborah Smith (Curator), Yu Yeon Kim (Curator), and David Adjaye (Architect)
Keynote: An African Pavilion
Simon Njami (Curator) in conversion with Robert Storr – A South African Pavilion
Panel discussion: Curating Africa
Chair: Mariam Sharp (Arts Council England), Niru Ratman (Director Store Gallery, London), Ekow Eshun (Director, Institute of Contemporary Arts, ICA, London), Courtney J Martin (Curator), Thelma Golden (Director, Studio Museum Harlem), Paul Domela, (Programme Director of Liverpool Biennial)
Reception: British Pavilion (courtesy of the British Council)
Day two, Friday 8 June
The Black Moving Cube
Introduction: Close The Black Moving Cube, David A Bailey (Curator)
Keynote: Post Colonialism and The End of Empire Gilane Tawadros (Independent Curator)
Panel Discussion: Post Colonialism and its Representations Chair: Mark Waugh (Writer and Curator), Jacques Ranciere (Theorist/Critic), Jalal Toufic (Artist), Otolith Group: Anjalika Saga and Kodwo Eshun (Artists), John Akomfrah (Artist), Zineb Sidera (Artist)
Plienmuseum Presentation & Discussion: Hosted by Mike Philips (Independent Curator and Cross- cultural Consultant to Tate Britain)
In Conversation: David Lammy (Minister for Culture UK) and Dr Augustus Casely-Hayford (Executive Director Arts Strategy: Arts Council England)
View LeafletIn addition to our symposia in Venice we organised a series of mobilised dialogues through the opening days of Documenta XII and sculpture projects muenster 07. This was followed by symposia at the Istanbul Biennial and London.
2007 was a once in a decade opportunity to visit Documenta and Munster consecutively and engage with their very different approaches to the aesthetics of display. ICF offered our group of 30 curators an opportunity to connect with these extraordinary projects. This stage of our journey was focused on the mediation and ephemerality of ideas and is not structured as a symposium but rather as a vehicle for idea distribution and the accumulation of new values. Over the following weeks we intended to move the dialectic of the Forum forwards toward our next formal presentation, which will be at the Istanbul Biennial in September.
At the 10th International Istanbul Biennial, titled Not Only Possible, But Also Necessary – Optimism in the age of global war, we considered the current discourse around architecture, cultural production and its reception. In this city, whose existence is predicated on trade and translations between faiths and cultures, we ask how can we remain optimistic about the role of art?
We hosted a symposium that collected and reflected on the nomadic trajectory of the International Curators Forum from Venice to Istanbul. We explored the threads of dialogue that have mutated beyond recognition, as well as those ideas that have retained their shape but still need future attention. We shared our conclusions on the issue of race within the agendas of international curators and present out theories on how leading international institutions can participate in creating more open and inclusive spaces to re-imagine aesthetics and produce cultural experiences that are sensitive to their audiences.
People:
Terry Adams, David Adjaye, John Akomfrah, Jonah Albert, Adelaide Bannerman, Chris Burton, Alicia Campbell, Yasmin Canvin, Hilary Carty, Gus Casely-Hayford, Paul Domela, Lina Džuverović, Tim Eastop, Ekow Eshun, Kodwo Eshun, Michael Forbes, Cheryl Gallagher, Thelma Golden, Simon Grosspietsch, Gina Ha-Gorlin, Qian Jing, Harjeet Kaur, Esen Kaya, Melanie Keen, Shama Khanna, Atsuko Kikuchi, Yu Yeon Kim, Sally Lai, Axel Lapp, Sook-Kyung Lee, Kwong Lee, Melanie Lenz, Cedar Lewisohn, Catherine Lucktaylor, Courtney J Martin, Eva McGovern, Syra Miah, Yvette Mutumba, Simon Njami, Joanne Peters, Paul Purgas, Juan Sebastian Ramirez, Jacques Rancière, Sara Raza, Anjalika Sagar, Sherman Mern Tat Sam, Edgar Schmitz, John Sealey, Zineb Sedira, Samenua Sesher, Shamita Sharmacharja, Mariam Sharp, Deborah Smith, Deborah Smith, Robert Storr, Ellie Stout, Claire Summerfield, Gilane Tawadros, Mark Waugh, Julia Waugh, Tania Wilmer, Jen Wu. View 57 more
This is the first major gathering of international curators, writers, artists and critics at the Venice Biennale to discuss and explore the changing idea of identity and the diaspora in the 21st century.
The symposium will provide a necessary platform for a critical discussion about the changing nature of representation within an increasingly globalised cultural context. It will pose essential questions about the economies of exhibition, urbanisation and regeneration. It will also consider the international infra-structural developments necessary to nurture and sustain a more representative and culturally diverse professional ecology for the visual arts.
Its point of departure is an essay by Jacques Derrida on the future after Apartheid, and asks: Where are we now? What spectres haunt this scene in the year that South Africa exhibits, for the first time, as guests in the Italian Pavilion and Britain celebrates the 200th anniversary of the Abolition of Slavery Act?
‘Nothing is delivered here in the present, nothing that would be presentable – only, in tomorrow’s rear view mirror, the late, ultimate racism, the last of many.’ – Jacques Derrida 1983: Racism’s Last Word
PROGRAMME
Day one, Thursday 7 June
Pan-European Encounters
Welcome from Symposium sponsors, Samenua Sesher Director decibel, Hilary Carty, Director Cultural Leadership
Prologue: Marco De Michelis (Dean of the University of Venice for the Arts)
Keynote: The International Curators Forum – A 21st Century Renaissance Moment, David A. Bailey (Curator)
Panel discussion: A Black Aesthetic
Chair: Mike Philips (Independent Curator and Cross-cultural Consultant to Tate Britain), Deborah Smith (Curator), Yu Yeon Kim (Curator), and David Adjaye (Architect)
Keynote: An African Pavilion
Simon Njami (Curator) in conversion with Robert Storr – A South African Pavilion
Panel discussion: Curating Africa
Chair: Mariam Sharp (Arts Council England), Niru Ratman (Director Store Gallery, London), Ekow Eshun (Director, Institute of Contemporary Arts, ICA, London), Courtney J Martin (Curator), Thelma Golden (Director, Studio Museum Harlem), Paul Domela, (Programme Director of Liverpool Biennial)
Reception: British Pavilion (courtesy of the British Council)
Day two, Friday 8 June
The Black Moving Cube
Introduction: Close The Black Moving Cube, David A Bailey (Curator)
Keynote: Post Colonialism and The End of Empire Gilane Tawadros (Independent Curator)
Panel Discussion: Post Colonialism and its Representations Chair: Mark Waugh (Writer and Curator), Jacques Ranciere (Theorist/Critic), Jalal Toufic (Artist), Otolith Group: Anjalika Saga and Kodwo Eshun (Artists), John Akomfrah (Artist), Zineb Sidera (Artist)
Plienmuseum Presentation & Discussion: Hosted by Mike Philips (Independent Curator and Cross- cultural Consultant to Tate Britain)
In Conversation: David Lammy (Minister for Culture UK) and Dr Augustus Casely-Hayford (Executive Director Arts Strategy: Arts Council England)
View LeafletIn addition to our symposia in Venice we organised a series of mobilised dialogues through the opening days of Documenta XII and sculpture projects muenster 07. This was followed by symposia at the Istanbul Biennial and London.
2007 was a once in a decade opportunity to visit Documenta and Munster consecutively and engage with their very different approaches to the aesthetics of display. ICF offered our group of 30 curators an opportunity to connect with these extraordinary projects. This stage of our journey was focused on the mediation and ephemerality of ideas and is not structured as a symposium but rather as a vehicle for idea distribution and the accumulation of new values. Over the following weeks we intended to move the dialectic of the Forum forwards toward our next formal presentation, which will be at the Istanbul Biennial in September.
At the 10th International Istanbul Biennial, titled Not Only Possible, But Also Necessary – Optimism in the age of global war, we considered the current discourse around architecture, cultural production and its reception. In this city, whose existence is predicated on trade and translations between faiths and cultures, we ask how can we remain optimistic about the role of art?
We hosted a symposium that collected and reflected on the nomadic trajectory of the International Curators Forum from Venice to Istanbul. We explored the threads of dialogue that have mutated beyond recognition, as well as those ideas that have retained their shape but still need future attention. We shared our conclusions on the issue of race within the agendas of international curators and present out theories on how leading international institutions can participate in creating more open and inclusive spaces to re-imagine aesthetics and produce cultural experiences that are sensitive to their audiences.
Dates:
7 Jun 2007 - 10 Jun 2007
Location:
Venice