LEARNING OUTCOMES
Students will learn how to research and formulate conceptual frameworks for curatorial projects. They will work collaboratively in groups together with course teacher(s) on planning a project from A to Z, writing a curatorial statement, selecting artistic content, public programme development, mediation and documentation.
Credits: 10
Schedule: 11.01.2022 - 08.04.2022
Teacher in charge (valid for whole curriculum period):
Teacher in charge (applies in this implementation): Patrizia Costantin, Bassam El Baroni
Contact information for the course (applies in this implementation):
Bassam El Baroni - bassam.elbaroni@aalto.fi
Patrizia Costantin - patrizia.costantin@aalto.fi
CEFR level (valid for whole curriculum period):
Language of instruction and studies (applies in this implementation):
Teaching language: English. Languages of study attainment: English
CONTENT, ASSESSMENT AND WORKLOAD
Content
valid for whole curriculum period:
A project that students plan and implement as a group using the interrogative model of inquiry on select themes and/or topics initiated by the course s teacher(s), from which they develop a public project (exhibition, event, seminar, publication etc). The course starts by building a strong theoretical grounding for the topic/theme and gradually works its way towards the practical side of curating.
applies in this implementation
‘Curating in the Live’ is a project-centred course that nonetheless starts with and includes some theoretical investigations. Students plan and implement a project as a group using the interrogative model of inquiry on select themes and/or topics initiated by the course s teachers, from which they develop a public project (exhibition, event, seminar, publication etc). The course starts by building a strong theoretical grounding for the topic/theme and gradually works its way towards the practical side of curating.
The theme or topic that we will interrogate in 2022 is “usefulness”. Due to a number of factors, the issue of art’s capacity or incapacity to be useful within the social realm has formed a consistent thread of inquiries and mode of operation within the field. We will address these factors and look at the different ways artists and curators have emphasized usefulness over other characteristics associated with artworks such as criticality, or aesthetics. This will be achieved through theory and considering a number of case studies – historical and contemporary - looking at them closely and navigating the debates that emerge from these cases. The schedule below is a work in progress, with only the first four sessions outlined, because along the way we will make collective decisions on the project and that requires a certain amount of flexibility, the schedule will be updated later in January accordingly. Morning sessions for the first half of the course will be based around lectures, presentations, and discussions, while the after-lunch period will take the form of brainstorming sessions based on materials (videos, texts, experiments) that participants will bring to the table to open up the process. The latter parts of the course will be centred around the production of a collectively curated project that will emerge from the many questions posed by “usefulness” as a general thematic and topic of inquiry.
Assessment Methods and Criteria
valid for whole curriculum period:
Coursework and course participation
Workload
valid for whole curriculum period:
120 hours of contact teaching, 150 hours of individual work. Requirement of all schedules activities a minimum of 80%.
DETAILS
Study Material
valid for whole curriculum period:
Readings (Theory, Philosophy and Scienctific Papers) updated on MyCourses, Latter Parts of Course mostly Practical
applies in this implementation
Available on MyCourses
Substitutes for Courses
valid for whole curriculum period:
Prerequisites
valid for whole curriculum period:
SDG: Sustainable Development Goals
4 Quality Education
5 Gender Equality
10 Reduced Inequality
16 Peace and Justice Strong Institutions
FURTHER INFORMATION
Further Information
valid for whole curriculum period:
Teaching Period:
2020-2021
(2021, 2022) - No teaching
Course Homepage: https://mycourses.aalto.fi/course/search.php?search=TAI-E314801
Registration for Courses: Sisu replaces Oodi on 9 August, 2021. Priority order to courses is according to the order of priority decided by the Academic committee for School of Arts, Design and Architecture: https://www.aalto.fi/en/services/registering-to-courses-and-the-order-of-priority-in-aalto-arts
via Weboodi
applies in this implementation
First session online only -
Details on the schedule
applies in this implementation
Upcoming Schedule 11 January to 1 February
11 January
Introducing the course, discussion about the course output(s), planning ahead.
Topic: Can we think of art as a form of trap-making as suggested by Gell and Singleton, what is meant by this exactly and what does it entail? Are there advantages and disadvantages to this point of view?
Readings:
- Alfred Gell, Vogel’s Net: Traps as Artworks and Artworks as Traps (Uploaded to MyCourses)
- Benedict Singleton, Maximum Jailbreak
https://www.e-flux.com/journal/46/60088/maximum-jailbreak/
- Benedict Singleton, (Notes Towards) Speculative Design
- Forging Rules: Glass Bead in Conversation with Keller Easterling and Benedict Singleton
18 January
Topic: Case Study #1 Arte Útil
Arte Útil or 'useful art' is an ongoing project established by artist Tania Bruguera and involving numerous artists and curators. Arte Útil draws on artistic thinking to imagine, create and implement tactics that change how we act in society. The session will examine Arte Útil and consider its proposals from different angles and perspectives. What are its strengths and what are its limitations?
Readings:
- John Byrne. 2016. Social Autonomy and the Use Value of Art. Afterall: A Journal of Art, Context and Enquiry, 42, 60–69. doi:10.1086/689804 (Uploaded to MyCourses)
- Sven Lutticken. 2019. Fetishize This! Artifacts and Other Agents at the Edge of Art. In B. von Bismarck, & B. Meyer-Krahmer (Eds.), Curatorial Things (pp. 283-309). Sternberg Press.
https://svenlutticken.files.wordpress.com/2020/07/lucc88tticken_fetishize-this_curatorial_things.pdf
- Stephen Wright. 2013. ‘Toward a Lexicon of Usership’
https://museumarteutil.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Toward-a-lexicon-of-usership.pdf
Resources
https://www.artscatalyst.org/video/tania-bruguera-arte-util-archive
https://vanabbemuseum.nl/en/programme/programme/museum-of-arte-util/
25 January
Topic: Can art change the world?...is the million dollar question that we will interrogate today from an art historical perspective. We will take a journey through art movements that, from the 20th century, have responded to urgencies of their time with the aim of addressing socio-political issues in a variety of ways. The scope of this session is to give you an overview of movements in art history that have shown how art can be a driving force for change to better understand the situation we are living at the present day.
Readings
Guy Debord. 1957. Report on the Construction of Situations and on the International Situationist Tendency's Conditions of Organization and Action. https://www.cddc.vt.edu/sionline/si/report.html
Lucy R. Lippard, “Trojan Horses: Activist Art and Power,” in Art after Modernism: Rethinking Representation, ed. Brian Wallis (New York: New Museum of Contemporary Art, 1984). Uploaded to MyCourses.
Irmgard Emmelhainz, Geopolitics and Contemporary Art, Part I: From Representation’s Ruin to Salvaging the Real (2016) https://www.e-flux.com/journal/69/60620/geopolitics-and-contemporary-art-part-i-from-representation-s-ruin-to-salvaging-the-real/
Jacques Ranciere, Dissensus. On Politics and Aesthetics. Chapter: 9 The Aesthetic Revolution and Its Outcomes (pp. 115-134). Uploaded to MyCourses.
Resources
https://www.cddc.vt.edu/sionline/index.html
1 February
Topic for 1 February: Case Study #2 The Artist Placement Group (APG)
The Artist Placement Group (APG) formed by artists and John Latham in 1966 in London and later enlarged to include diverse members. The organisation actively sought to reposition the role of the artist within a wider social context, including government and commerce, while at the same time playing an important part in the history of conceptual art during the 1960s and 1970s.
Reading:
- Anthony Hudek. 2013. Staging Dissonance: Artist Placement Group’s Performative (Non)Exhibitions. Journal of Curatorial Studies, 2(3), 302–328. (Uploaded to MyCourses)
- Claire Bishop. Rate of Return: The Artist Placement Group
https://www.artforum.com/print/201008/rate-of-return-the-artist-placement-group-26419
Resources
https://en.contextishalfthework.net/
https://barbarasteveni.org/Work-APG-Artist-Placement-group
http://www.ravenrow.org/exhibition/artist_placement_group/
https://www.frieze.com/article/context-half-work