Olivia Plender, Newsroom,
Installation Shot, 'The Greenroom:
Reconsidering the Documentary and Contemporary Art'
Courtesy of the Artist and Maria Lind
Monday, 23 February 2009 / 18:00
Nedre gate 7 / Oslo
Studio 1 / Side Entrance
Documentary practices have become one of the most significant and complex tendencies within art during the last two decades. Traditional documentary photography and film have been reinvented and reinvigorated, merged with traditions and practices such as video, performance and Conceptual art. Recent documentary works attest to a new diversity and complexity of forms: they range from conceptual 'mockumentaries' to reflexive photo essays, from split-screen slide shows to found-footage video reportage, or from installations without any lens-based medium to printed matter. Many of them constitute an attempt to search for suitable forms and methods of discussing social content, either of historical nature or related to recent political and economic upheaval. Maria Lind's presentation will analyse this trend, which is also the focus of a research project and exhibition currently being developed at the Centre for Curatorial Studies at Bard College.
Since January 2008, Maria Lind is the director of the Graduate Program, Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY. In January 2009, Lind received the Walter Hopps Award for Curatorial Achievement, an award that recognises curators who have made a significant contribution to the field of contemporary art. From 2005 to 2007 Lind was the Director of IASPIS (International Artist Studio Program in Sweden) in Stockholm. Prior to her position at IASPIS, Lind was the Director of Kunstverein München, Munich, Germany, where she, together with a curatorial team consisting at different times of Sören Grammel, Katharina Schlieben, Tessa Praun, Ana Paula Cohen and Judith Schwarzbart, ran a programme which involved artists such as Deimantas Narkevicius, Oda Projesi, Bojan Sarcevic, Philippe Parreno and Marion von Osten. The format of a retrospective or survey exhibition was explored in a one-year long retrospective with Christine Borland in 2002-03, only ever showing one piece at a time, and a retrospective project in the form of a seven-day-long workshop with Rirkrit Tiravanija. The group project 'Totally Motivated: A Socio-cultural Manoeuvre' was a collaboration between five curators and ten artists looking at the relationship between 'amateur' and 'professional' art and culture. From 1997 to 2001 she was curator at Moderna Museet in Stockholm and, in 1998, co-curator of Manifesta 2, Europe's biennial for contemporary art. Responsible for Moderna Museet Projekt, Lind worked with artists on a series of 29 commissions that took place in a temporary project space, within or beyond the museum. There she also curated 'What If: Art on the Verge of Architecture and Design', filtered by Liam Gillick. Lind was one of ten contributing curators to Phaidon's Fresh Cream book, and she has written for numerous magazines including Index (where she was on the editorial board), catalogues and other publications. She is the co-editor of the recent books Curating with Light Luggage and Collected Newsletter (Revolver Archiv für aktuelle Kunst), Taking the Matter into Common Hands: Collaborative Practices in Contemporary Art (Blackdog Publishing), as well as the report European Cultural Policies 2015 and The Greenroom: Reconsidering the Documentary and Contemporary Art. She has been teaching and lecturing at different art schools since the early 1990s, including at the University Colleges of Fine Art in Umeå and Stockholm, the Royal College of Art and Goldsmiths College in London, Bard Center for Curatorial Studies in Annandale-on-Hudson, USA the Emily Carr Institute of Art in Vancouver, Canada and the Academy of Fine Arts in Oslo, Norway.
The Office for Contemporary Art Norway runs an International Visitor Programme to support international curators and cultural producers in their research in Norway for upcoming exhibitions and projects. Participation in the programme is by invitation although requests for visits are considered based on availability when addressed to OCA.
The Office for Contemporary Art Norway is a private foundation and was founded by The Norwegian Ministry of Culture and Church Affairs and The Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in fall 2001. The main aim of the Office for Contemporary Art Norway is to develop collaborations in contemporary art between Norway and the international art scene. The Office for Contemporary Art Norway aims to become a profiled contributor to the discourses of contemporary art.