The seminar teaches an interdisciplinary approach to analyzing contemporary curatorial and artistic practices in our globalized contemporary art world. Taking the Venice Biennale for Contemporary Art 2015 as a relevant case study, we discuss the roles and concepts of specific curators in relation with the artists/works that will participate in Venice from art-historical and anthropological perspectives. A main aim is to develop interdisciplinary methodological approaches that allow us to critically (re)consider long-standing as well as recent curatorial strategies that frame the works of artists from different geographical regions and cultural backgrounds in the traditionally “nationalist” exhibition taxonomy of the Biennale. The seminar is research-based and includes an excursion to the Venice Biennale (mandatory) allowing the students to conduct their own research projects on either the overall theme of the exhibition, on a single national pavilion, or a specific curator and his framing of particular artists. These projects will be developed throughout the seminar and concluded by means of a written term paper.
The seminar will introduce students to relevant ethnographic and art-historical methods and provide room for existent skills and knowledge to be deepened by means of individual and team work based seminar phases. Participants will learn to reflect critically on the Venice Biennale and the kind of art notion that it projects with a special focus on the art historical context and the cultural dimension of this prominent exhibition format.
The seminar provides students with a special opportunity to sharpen their writing skills on art and exhibitions. Depending on the nature of the collected data in Venice the final term paper may take the shape of a visual essay that students will conceptualise and accomplish based on a wiki that allows to integrate visual with textual material.
Cathrine Bublatzky 