[iDC] media curating lists as pedagogical, exploratory and speculative texts

[Jerome Grand]

> They are as much middlemen as curators.  Curators are not producing art, they
> are producing information about art.

In response to your idea that curators do not produce art but simply
relate the information about it is a narrow view of the curatorial
work and today's art production. Modes of production in the
contemporary art world are becoming more and more elaborate. Many
institutions do not only collect and mediate art, but engage in
extensive production. (a big long list could be plugged in here).
Museum's and art center's of all sort work directly with artists and
commission pieces/projects that are 'not yet made.' For these 'not yet
made,' institutions offer funding, space/sites, time, fabrication
crews, and an active dialogue with the artists. The institutions
define a frame for the artists to explore and allow the production of
these projects/pieces. The contemporary art curator is (I'll try to
state it simply but not grotesquely) the a creative node between
artists and institutions' work force, framing and making these
production happen with the artists and sometimes hundreds of other
people...

In short there are very few  artists today that are integrated in teh
contemporary art circuit that produce their work alone and I would
also claim that no work of art has been autonomously produce.

This is one asset of the curatorial work today and many postings could
be made on this site to further understand the work that happens in
the closed-off offices of museums, galleries, art centers, and homes
of independent curators (whoever they are).

A good example happening right now concerning this is the Büchel vs.
MASS MoCA issue going down this summer + the on-going exhibition: MADE
at MASS MoCA.

night,

jerome


On 8/22/07, Alexis Turner <subbies at redheadedstepchild.org> wrote:
> They are as much middlemen as curators.  Curators are not producing art, they
> are producing information about art.  If you want merely to look at art, visit
> an artist's studio.  If you want to *know* about art or learn about connections
> between different artists, a curator collects those connections for you and
> produces a document or collection that can inform.
>
> There are, of course, other ways to learn about art, including building that
> wealth of knowledge completely by yourself.  Just as with all the things I have
> mentioned below - roads, food, buildings.  The individuals who make those
> available for me are "middlemen" insofar as they keep me from having to create
> those things myself.  Curators keep me from having to glean all bits of
> knowledge myself.
>
> In that regard,the original post which you have unfortunately clipped away was
> not correct in referring to the curatorial act as a middle one while failing to
> recognize that it produces something new in the process.
> -Alexis
>
>
> On Wed, 22 Aug 2007, J Rabie wrote:
>
> ::Le 21 août 07, à 23:45, Alexis Turner a écrit :
> ::
> ::> Personally, I'm quite grateful for a lot of middlemen,
> ::> including the ones who build my roads and buildings for me, as well as the
> ::> ones
> ::> who farm my food for me.
> ::
> ::
> ::These you speak of are not "middlemen", they are the producers and providers.
> ::
> ::The problem for the farmers is that to get to you they have to go through
> ::distributors and supermarkets, who get the biggest cut of the money paid by
> ::you, the final consumer. They are the "middlemen", and while perhaps they
> ::cannot be done without - difficult for you to be in contact with all the
> ::various farmers who produce all your different needs - there is a need to
> ::reduce the preeminence of their role in the chain, notably in financial terms
> ::- they get too much, the farmers too little.
> ::
> ::Joe.
> ::
> ::
>
> + --------
>     redheadedstepchild.org
>          ------- +
> _______________________________________________
> iDC -- mailing list of the Institute for Distributed Creativity (distributedcreativity.org)
> iDC at mailman.thing.net
> https://mailman.thing.net/mailman/listinfo/idc
>
> List Archive:
> http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/
>
> iDC Photo Stream:
> http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/idcnetwork/
>
> RSS feed:
> http://rss.gmane.org/gmane.culture.media.idc
>
> iDC Chat on Facebook:
> http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2457237647
>
> Share relevant URLs on Del.icio.us by adding the tag iDCref
>