To curate or not to curate, 2008 in Europe: urban BB5 and post-industrial Manifesta 7

London-based Macedonian artist and writer Nadja Prlja compares the urban and modern 5th Berlin Biennial BB5: When Things Cast No Shadow (5 April - 15 June 2008) with Manifesta 7 (19 July - 2 November 2008) which occupied the whole arae of Trentoni in Italy. Prlja pays particular attention to the differences in the ways the projects were curated.

Published December 2008

Exit music: a lake and a stand of trees: George Popperwell

exit music: a lake and a stand of trees: George Popperwell
Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia (CACSA)
25 July  7 September 2008

Published December 2008

What would it mean to win? a film by Zanny Begg and Oliver Ressler

Published December 2008

Back from the brink: culture in Timor-Leste

The Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory (MAGNT)'s Curator of Southeast Asian Art and Material Culture Joanna Barrkman curated Husi Bei Ala Timor Sira Nia Liman /From the Hands of Our Ancestors which is on at MAGNT in Darwin from 21 November 2008 to 12 July 2009. The show celebrates the survival of Timor-Leste's cultural inheritance and asks whether traditional art forms and techniques have a role to play in the formation and assertion of Timor-Leste's national and cultural identity.

Published December 2008

Artrave

Published December 2008

Curating a psycho-geography Campbelltown Arts Centre and the genius of Lisa Havilah

Campbelltown Arts Centre's chief curator and director Lisa Havilah creates challenging and confronting exhibitions like For Matthew and Others (2006), News from Islands (2007) and Ai Weiwei: Under Construction (2008). She believes that: 'contemporary art centres that sit outside of the metropolitan centres provide the highest level of opportunity for the development and application of new forms of curatorial practice.'

Published December 2008

Species enhancement by international gene pool

Director of Wollongong City Gallery Craig Judd writes about the memorable experience of curating Wild Thang: post pop from the MCA, a show that combined works from the MCA's collection with corresponding pieces in the collections of the towns the exhibition visited: Bathurst, Armidale, Gold Coast and Albury.

Published December 2008

Editorial

Published December 2008

Hello Tokyo! Good to see you again

Artspace curator Reuben Keehan reflects on the Australia-Japan Visual Art Forum convened by Asialink in June 2008 as the Biennale of Sydney opened.
The thirty delegates concluded the stimulating forum with recommendations about ongoing collaborations between curators using a variety of models, as well as the new ideas to be pursued of audience-in-residence programs and an Asian version of Manifesta.

Published December 2008

25th National and Torres Strait Islander Art Award (NATSIAA)

25th National and Torres Strait Islander Art Award (NATSIAA)
Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory (MAGNT)
15 August  26 October 2008

Published December 2008

Neo Goth: black in black

Neo Goth: Back in Black
Curator: Alison Kubler
UQ Art Museum, University of Queensland, Brisbane
25 July - 21 September 2008

Published December 2008

Curating Chinese themes: cheap labour, migration and capital, Shanghai Biennale and Guangzhou Triennial

In September 2008 Dylan Rainforth went to both the 7th Shanghai Biennale (Translocalmotion) and the 3rd Guangzhou Triennial (Farewell to Post-Colonialism). While he found mixed messages in Shanghai which was curated by artistic director Zhang Qing assisted by Julian Heynen and Henk Slager, it was Guangzhou curated by Gao Shiming, Sarat Maharaj and Johnson Chang that hit the sweet spot with 'witty, people-powered ways forward.'

Published December 2008