19 EUR

Collection TRANSformacije, book number 24
Urednik zbirke: Janez Janša
256 pages
©Maska, Ljubljana, 2008
ISBN 978-961-6572-12-5

Zbirka TRANSformacije

Beti Žerovc: Curator and contemporary art – conversations

19 EUR

Through conversations and case-studies, this book examines the phenomenon of the curator in contemporary art, seeking to define as precisely as possible his development, attributes, and activities – in other words, to elucidate the nature of »species« we are dealing with in this professional category, and to explain its development. To do this, the book looks at the curator within the context of contemporary capitalism, for this is his »natural habitat«.

Collection TRANSformacije, book number 24
Urednik zbirke: Janez Janša
256 pages
©Maska, Ljubljana, 2008
ISBN 978-961-6572-12-5

The curator

It finds that the curator has emerged, over the past few decades, in conjunction with the ever-expanding infrastructural and financial support system of contemporary art, the primary purpose of which is to ensure the optimal and freest development for art and for artists. But at the same time, this system has turned into a special economic system (parallel to the original market economy), whereby, among other things, a need is created for a large number of people who can manage and organise this economy of »apparent artistic autonomy«, distribute the funds allocated for this purpose, and so forth. It is here that the curator has been able to assume his role, in particular, as someone who possesses two very different and quite contradictory sets of skills – managerial and artistic – which he combines in his work and which enable him to manoeuvre between artists on the one side and today’s funders of contemporary art on the other.

Generally speaking, this duality seems to be constitutive of the curator’s work. To put it bluntly, it is the means by which the curator manages to meld together the interests of those who commission art, who support it because of the economic, social, and ideological benefits they thus receive, and art itself, which as a rule declares itself to be entirely opposed to such interests. The curator, then, organises art into attractive and profitmaking events, while at the same time he remains the primary »keeper of the cult«.

O avtorici

Beti Žerovc je doktorica umetnostne zgodovine, raziskovalka in teoretičarka. Njeni raziskovalni področji sta vizualna umetnost in umetnostni sistem v zadnjem stoletju in pol, še zlasti njuna vloga v družbi. V pričujoči knjigi se je s pomočjo sogovornikov posvetila raziskovanju kuratorja kot novega in vplivnega fenomena v sodobni umetnosti zadnjih desetletij. Živi v Ljubljani. Poleg raziskovanja in pisanja predava, občasno ureja znanstveno literaturo in organizira znanstvena ter strokovna srečanja. Njena prva knjiga Rihard Jakopič – umetnik in strateg je izšla leta 2002.

Kazalo

1 Začetki in uveljavitev ku ratorja
Pierre Restany
Zoran Kržišnik
Harald Szeemann
Daniel Buren
Damien Hirst
Werner Fenz
Nevenka Šivavec in Breda Škrjanec

2 Devetdeseta leta: etik a nad estetik o
Charles Esche
Hou Hanru
Vasif Kortun

3 Novo tisočletje. Novo desetletje …
Gregor Podnar
Sanja Iveković, Andreja Kulunčić in Mladen Stilinović
Hans Ulrich Obrist
Walter Benjamin

Summary

Curator and Contemporary Art. Conversations 252

Knjiga v javnosti

Asta Vrečko: Kuratorji ko sodobni politiki
Delo / Pogledi / 11. 3. 2012
Kritični družbeni angažma je (v umetnosti) priljubljena forma, ki se prepogosto jemlje kot modni dodatek, ki ga lahko situaciji primerno oblečeš ali slečeš in se ga na ta način zlorablja, da na koncu ostane zgolj čista forma. Z avtoričinimi besedami, preko katerih nas nagovarjajo tudi nikoli zastarele misli Walterja Benjamina: »Resni družbeni angažma, ki cilja na dejanske učinke, predpostavlja transparentnost pogojev protagonistovega delovanja in na prvem mestu sposobnost reflektiranja lastne pozicije in pogojev delovanja, je nezdružljiv s skupino, katere predstavniki takšen analitični pogled odvračajo od sebe, minimizirajo tovrstno pogojenost in nas prepričujejo, da pogoji nastanka njihovih razstav niso niti malo pomembni niti bistveni za vsebine in verodostojnost njihovih sporočil.«

Beti Žerovc: V umetnosti vlada zanikana ekonomija
intervju / Jela Krečič / Delo / 10. 11. 2008
Resnica, kateri sta zavezana muzejski kustos in kurator, torej ni ista; kjer prvi, vsaj na deklarativni ravni, poskuša čim bolj objektivno in nepristransko obravnavati material, kot naj bi mu ga ponujala zgodovina, si drugi fleksibilneje »izbira«, čemu je zavezan, denimo, umetniškim kriterijem, političnim korektnostim, drugim političnim prepričanjem, intimnim obsesijam ipd.

V založbi Maska je izšla knjiga Beti Žerovc, »Kurator in sodobna umetnost«
TV Slovenija / Kultura / 1. 10. 2008
»Kurator je prevajalec med umetnikom, publiko in kapitalom … v bistvu je on tisti, ki se odloča za teme, ki vabi umetnike, ki celo lahko umetniška dela naroča, saj ta zdaj zelo pogosto nastajajo konkretno na temo, ki jo predlaga kurator.«
Beti Žerovc

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