Curatorial Lectures 2022-23: The Curated Institution
Each academic year, Curatorial Studies at KASK & Conservatorium School of Arts, S.M.A.K. and Ghent University co-organise the Curatorial Lectures series, inviting curators to share certain aspects of their practice. Following ‘Working with Artists’ (2017-18), ‘Learning from Artists’ (2018-19), ‘Working with Collections’ (2019-20), ‘Working with Space’ (2020-21), and ‘Curating at the Nexus of Change’ (2021-22) this year’s series ‘The Curated Institution’ casts a wide eye on the notion of curating as a form of institutional leadership. How can an institution be curated and what can curators do to change, tweak or reimagine institutional structures from an artistic point of view?
Past speakers in the Curatorial Lectures series have included Cédric Fauq, Yolande Zola Zoli van der Heide, Simon Njami, Zoé Whitley, Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli, Karen Archey, Cecilia Alemani, Rebecca Lamarche-Vadel, Joanna Mytkowska, Sofia Hernández Chong Cuy, Penelope Curtis, Mathieu Copeland, Anthony Huberman, Jean-Hubert Martin, Chus Martínez, Gabi Ngcobo, Susanne Pfeffer, Nicolaus Schafhausen and Adam Szymczyk.
I don't have any plans, I'm fumbling around: on making exhibitions.
I will talk about my curatorial practice, focusing on some key exhibitions I have organized inside and outside institutional contexts.
I will focus on the MACRO experience, on what it means to rethink the role of a public institution by transforming it into a space of interrogation for contradictory ideas, forms, and experiences. Institutions should not be seen as spaces in which to display art objects, but as contested spaces that can activate an ongoing process of self-interrogation.
The exhibition is a tool to develop a situation that can have multiple points of access both visually and conceptually, offering the viewer a wide range of possibilities and allowing different narratives to exist. I would like to emphasize the idea of the exhibition as a "non-place" space for the production of meaning, where viewers can transform from voyeurs to accomplices.
Biography
Luca Lo Pinto (1981) is the artistic director of MACRO - Museum of Contemporary Art of Rome. From 2014 to 2019 he worked as curator of Kunsthalle Wien. He is co-founder of the magazine and publishing house NERO. He produced a range of solo exhibitions with artists including Simone Forti, Nathalie du Pasquier, Jason Dodge, Tony Cokes, Cinzia Ruggeri, Camille Henrot, Olaf Nicolai, Pierre Bismuth, Babette Mangolte, Lawrence Weiner, Gelatin&Liam Gillick, Charlemagne Palestine as well as publications with Emilio Prini, Mario Garcia Torres and Mario Diacono. Other curatorial projects include Io, Luca Vitone (PAC, Milan),16th Art Quadriennale (Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome), Le Regole del Gioco (Achille Castiglioni Studio-Museum, Milan); Trapped in the closet (Carnegie Library/FRAC Champagne Ardenne, Reims), Antigrazioso (Palais de Toyko, Paris); AnderSennoSogno (H.C. Andersen Museum, Rome); D’après Giorgio (Giorgio de Chirico Foundation, Rome); Conversation Pieces (Mario Praz Museum, Rome). His essays have been published in many catalogues and international magazines. In 2012 he edited the book Documenta 1955-2012. The endless story of two lovers.
