Visual Arts, Performing Arts and Museums (SWICH)

What kind of new exhibitionary formats have resulted from the interaction between artists and curators and how they may have a sustaining impact? How can we avoid falling into the trap of using an artist installation to offer a 'quick fix'? Which collaborations have worked and what factors were critical in making some of them more successful than others?

This workshop centres on the dialogue between artists and curators in the representation of cultures, and it will discuss and evaluate examples of such collaborations in different museum types. In recent years several ethnography museums have opened their spaces to contemporary artists inviting them to use their collections as sources of inspiration for the creation of works of art or projects of cultural critique. On one hand, such practices have been fruitful, in facilitating the sharing of authority and finding new modes of engaging with publics; on the other hand, complementary and similarly innovative practices need to be developed to engage traditional and new audiences.

The workshop is part of the European project SWICH.

International consortium of 10 European museums: Weltmuseum Wien, Vienna; Stichting Nationaal Museum van Wereldculturen, Leiden; Musée royal de l’Afrique centrale, Tervuren; Musée des Civilisations de l'Europe et de la Méditerranée, Marseille; Museums of World Culture, Stockholm; Linden-Museum, Stuttgart; Museo Nazionale Preistorico Etnografico Luigi Pigorini, Rome; Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge; Slovene Ethnographic Museum, Ljubljana; Museum of World Cultures, Barcelona; and Culture Lab - International Cultural Expertise.