The Nature of the Curator - Essay Example

Curation A curator is one who designs the way in which an exhibit will be shown in order to guide the viewer through the experience in a way that adds meaning to the event. Control is part of the domain of the curator as they assert control over the experience in a way that is beyond that of the artist. The way in which the curator creates a narrative, whether tangible of intangible, can create the essence of the experience. According to Rosenbaum, “curation has always been the process of discerning quality” (6). In determining the quality of the work and in deciding which ways the work can best be represented to assert that quality, curation creates a moment of experience in which the viewer shares that point of view and is given space in which to find how that point of view can be discovered. The nature of the curator in creating an exhibit is in finding a way to define who, in the artist to curator relationship, designs what the viewer will see. According to Rugg and Sedgwick, the division between the curator and the artist creates a dilemma on how the eventual outcome of the viewing of the art can be determined. They state that “The heightened preoccupation with the authorial aspect of curating might be seen as a defensive reaction to the shared critical and cultural values and criteria through which the institutional power of curating is mediated and legitimized” (97). In discussing the authority of the act of curating, one is discussing the way in which the position of the curator becomes one of control in determining some of the interpretation of the work of the artist. In developing an exhibit of contemporary art, the nature of the exhibit must engage the viewer in such a way to put them in a space that provides context for the pieces that are shown. The pieces should have a “passive social and material relationship dominated by the eye and a fashionable sense of order (Harding 39). As the observer moves through the space, the arrangement of the pieces should create a narrative, a sense of theme that pulls the viewer through the exhibit (Burton 112). There has been some movement towards anti-curation, the nature of the anti-art movement spilling over to include the negation of curation as a viable part of the experience of art (O’Neill and Andreasen 60). However, this movement denies the importance of how art is placed, thus denying the viewer of the best possible positioning of art within the space. Within the narrative, the curator is not necessarily intended to create a specific, tangible narration, but the feeling of the space as it relates to the work becomes a moving spectacle of thought. That is the relationship that creates the narration of the space. The work that I will be exhibiting has a narrative that speaks of a culture and of the changes within that culture. Artefacts have the capacity of creating a narrative about a culture, just like art can create that same type of narrative when focused on aspects of culture (Stokes 67). This is not always true of a space in which contemporary work is exhibited. However, with the story of a culture involved, the narrative takes on a life that exposes the art for the way it will affect the viewer. With a set of work that is in touch with an organic element of a culture, such as my work, the nature of the exhibit should not be to have a linear or boxed in feeling from the way in which the artwork is arranged. The work is about nature, about the curves and nuances of life, thus to have a squared off exhibit or something that was directly linear would ruin the potential experience that the viewer can have as they engage the work. In Mediated Environments, Gleiniger, Hilbeck, and Scott discuss the way in which multiple disciplines can create a feeling for certain environments (9). In creating an environment that enhances the subject of the art, the exhibit will reflect the aesthetic that has been attempted in the artwork. The nature of an exhibit that includes something about an environment will find reflection through an atmosphere that opens up the viewer to the feeling of the environment (Morphy 20). Alexenberg suggests that some artwork is designed to reveal a solution to a problem (85). While my artwork does not seek to solve a problem, it does discuss issues about the nature of the culture from which I have created the subject matter. In finding different ways to discuss the problems, there are hints of a combination of the environment and of the ways in which the environment of the culture is infused within the work. Where some of the trends in curation, in creating the exhibit in which the artwork is experienced, is in determining the way in which the artwork engages the full story of its theme, both in environment and in topic matters that suggest issues about a culture. One of the purposes of the curator becomes involved in the relationship that is developed with the artist. According to Raney “I want to see the practice of exhibition making go beyond mere display, where the labour of the artist is interpreted and the views of the curator are put forward to cohere with the perceived intention of the artist” (107). In this relationship, the curator is a ‘propagandist’ for the artist, creating a bridge between the artist and the audience. There are two concepts that must be considered when curating one’s own exhibit. The first aspect is that the interpretation that is made would be directly connected to that of the artist as they are the same individual. On the other hand, the second concept of the artist curating their own work is that an outside point of view, a fresh perspective never engages the work in order to see something that perhaps the artist has not discovered about his or her own work. According to Marcus and Myers, “Modernist theory and its essentializing logic rest on curatorial self-effacement, wherein those people who actually determine which objects get seen also assert the historical inevitability of their production” (271). In other words, the commercialization of art has presented a position in which the curator is the intermediate between what is desired by the consumer and the production of the artist. Raney states that one of the struggles of the curator is “how to maintain the integrity of one’s intellectual project without being seen to be strangling the voice of the artist” (108). One aspect of curation can be determined for its association with feminism, which is devoted to the curation of work by women. In trying to equalize the integrity of the work with the voice, the female voice requires special attention. According to Marstine, feminist work is “a body of ideas and political perspectives” that are centered on the emerging female aesthetic (65). This perspective must be considered as curation of my work is considered. Bouquet and Porto discuss the need to create a level of ‘enchantment’ within an exhibit, a sense that the work is within the space and is drawing the viewer into the universe of that space (18). The importance of self-reflexivity, especially when concerned with the nature of curating an exhibit, is in the power of curation to effectively or ineffectively create the experience of the viewer (Farquharson 40). The art speaks for itself, but the exhibit speaks for the artist, conveying the overall image of the intention of a body of work to the public. In curating one’s own work, the pieces will not have the benefit or the burden of an outside imposition of interpretation which can have an effect on the end result. In creating an organic state of movement within the exhibit, the work will be represented for its culture and environmental reflection. In creating an exhibit for this work, the feeling of the event should reflect the overall position that is taken by the pieces and create an experience for the viewers that is held through the interpretation of the art. Works Cited Alexenberg, Melvin L. The Future of Art in a Postdigital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness. Bristol: Intellect L & D E F A E, 2010. Print. Burton, David. Exhibiting Student Art: The Essential Guide for Teachers. New York: Teachers College Press, 2006. Print. Bouquet, Mary, and Nuno Porto. Science, Magic and Religion: The Ritual Processes of Museum Magic. New York: Berghahn Books, 2006. Print. Farquharson, Alex. British Art Show 6. London: Hayward Gallery, 2005. Print. Gleiniger, Andrea, Angelika Hilbeck, and Jill Scott. Mediated Environments. Wien: Springer Wien, 2011. Print. Harding, Anna. Curating the Contemporary Art Museum and Beyond. London: Academy Ed, 1997. Print. Marcus, George E, and Fred R. Myers. The Traffic in Culture: Refiguring Art and Anthropology. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995. Print. Marstine, Janet. New Museum Theory and Practice: An Introduction. Malden, Mass: Blackwell, 2006. Print. Morphy, Howard, and Margo S. Boles. Art from the Land: Dialogues with the Kluge-Ruhe Collection of Australian Aboriginal Art. Charlottesville: University of Virginia, 1999. Print. Newsom, Barbara Y. The Art Museum As Educator: A Coll. of Studies As Guides to Practice and Policy. Berkeley: Univ. of California Press, 1978. Print. O'Neill, Paul, and Soren Andreasen. Curating Subjects. London: Open Editions, 2007. Print. Raney, Karen. Art in Question. London [u.a.: Continuum, 2003. Print. Rosenbaum, Steven C. Curation Nation: How to Win in a World Where Consumers Are Creators. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2011. Print. Rugg, Judith, and Michele Sedgwick. Issues in Curating Contemporary Art and Performance. Bristol, UK: Intellect, 2007. Print. Stokes, Jane. How to Do Media & Cultural Studies. London: SAGE Publ, 2003. Print. Read More