Constellations: HAA 2401 Special Topics Contemporary - Curating Contemporary Culture

During the 1990s, the curators of major international exhibitions became prominent among those who identified tendencies, defined values, and set agendas within contemporary artworlds throughout the world. While this phenomenon has been frequently noted, it is just beginning to receive attention from historians and attract theoretical examination. This seminar will focus on two questions arising from the playing out of this phenomenon.  What are the constituents of contemporary curatorial thought today?  What has been the historical trajectory of contemporary curatorial discourse?  Key exhibitions, events and installations, as well as texts by curators, critics and historians will be examined.  These questions are the basis of two recent texts that will be core reading: Terry Smith, Thinking Contemporary Curating (Independent Curators International, New York, 2012) and Paul O’Neill, The Culture of Curating and the Curating of Culture(s) (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2012).  While the emphasis will be on the visual arts, and on recent and contemporary art, it is to be noted that contemporary art is rapidly expanding to encompass a number of other art forms (not least cinema, performance, dance, sound, architecture and design), and that contemporary curating frequently entails revisiting past art, periods and histories, as well as future projections and ahistorical imaginings. The seminar will, therefore, be open to students in other departments and programs.