"Muitos, como dizia Artaud, referindo-se aos críticos, "gostariam que a nossa aprendizagem fosse feita entre quarto paredes, fechada no laboratórios", mas nos fazemos cena aberta, cara a cara com o publico. "Many", as Artsud used to say, referring to the critics, "would like our learning to take place within four walls, enclosed in laboratories", but we rather do it openly, face to face with the public" (Itaqui, 2005). "Fields are greener in their description than in their actual greenness. Flowers, if described with phrases that define them in the air of the imagination, will have colours with a durability not found in cellular life" (Zenith, 2001). This thesis proposes Critical Portfolio as a new format for methodological exchange between curators of contemporary visual arts. The research took place between the years of 2001 and 2006 and was based on the curotion of exhibitions with strong visible idiosyncratic approaches to selection and display (these becoming the research questions). It wasfollowed by the documentation and critical reflection of their associated methodologiesand final outputs, and resulted in a Critical Portfolio with clear links threaded between thevarious sections. The research is an enquiry into the nature of process and impacts upon themethodological visibility of emerging fields of curatorial practice and research.This charting of curatorial activity is divided in two parts:Projects included (with relation to the research questions) and projects excluded (with no clear relation to the research questions). Part 1- The projects included (4th year Expo, B-Sides - The Sculpure Show, Art Cup and A-Tipis) have token place in various European institutions and propose specific approaches to selection and display.Part 2- Projects excluded (Ver?o, Her?is e ViI es, Gran Pacman etc) do not show a clear relation to methods of selection and display. Each individual project in Part 1 is organized according to a common structure consisting of Project Image, Exhibition Pro-Forma, Concept Development, Portfolio Images,Correspondence between Curator and Artists, and Process Documentation. This structure, which takes a different configuration in each of the projects, allows for a clear and objective search for specific elements and contributes to new possibilities for comparison. The relation between the projects and the curatorial methods of selection and displaydenote critical preoccupations which become synthesized in the Curatorial Programms. This thesis identifies a "gap" in the structure of curatorial handbooks and proposes an approach that will not only close it, but bring more depth to an arising discussion around curatorial methodologies. Imagining this Critical Portfolio turns into a chapter of a curatorial handbook (synthesis of a curator's practice), the handbook is thus turned into a library/archive hosting each individual curator's documented methodology (Capital Culturalas repository of multiple curatorial practices is described in the Conclusion).

This thesis investigates the evolution of curatorial practice in Britain and the United States in the first four decades of the twentieth century through an analysis of the formative years of two museums, the Wallace and Frick Collections, and of two academic programmes, the Fogg Art Museum Course at Harvard University and the Courtauld Institute of Art at the University of London. Through these case studies, this study charts the emergence and development of a specialised curatorial knowledge base that was influenced by traditions of connoisseurship and criticism and shaped by discussions surrounding art history’s disciplinary parameters taking place in the museum, the press, the art market and the university. This investigation makes visible the processes through which art museum curators, keepers and directors collaborated in the creation and standardisation of their own expertise and contends that this quest was fundamentally intertwined with struggles for authority, agency and professional recognition. The manifestation of this expertise resulted in a renegotiation of institutional power dynamics and gave rise to a new type of art museum leader: the connoisseur-scholar, who performed an important function in the art museum’s transition from a space dominated by gentlemanly amateurs to one in which academically trained art historians increasingly assumed positions of authority. Asserting that the formation of this knowledge base cannot be separated from the academic institutionalisation of art history and curatorial training, this study demonstrates that individuals operating in the spheres of the art museum and the university were engaged in a dialogue through which the core values of these respective endeavours were realised. Detailing these processes and relationships and locating them within the context of a shift towards aesthetic idealism, this thesis provides insight into the historical origins of modern-day curatorial practice in Britain and the United States.

Syfte: Projektet har som syfte att ta reda på hur fenomenet Rotationcuration har förändrat arbetet med Sverige som varumärke. Frågeställningar: Den övergripande frågeställningen som uppsatsen utgår ifrån är: Hur har rotationcuration förändrat arbetet med varumärket Sverige för VisitSweden? För att besvara huvudfrågeställningen på ett enklare sätt används ett flertal underfrågor vilket följer: Vilka strategier använder VisitSweden (VisitSweden.) sig av för att marknadsföra Sverige på Twitter? Vilken syn har VisitSweden. på Sociala medier? Hur ser varumärkesbyggandet ut på twitterkanalen @sweden när det kommer till varumärket Sverige? Hur användandet av kuratorer demokratiserat arbetet med projektet Curators of Sweden? Teori: De teorier som uppsatsen huvudsakligen utgår ifrån är Nations branding, Public diplomacy och Medialisering med tyngden på Public diplomacy. Förutom dessa har även teorier om Public relations och Publika sfären använts i viss mån. Metod: Uppsatsen är en fallstudie av Curators of Sweden. Inom ramen för fallstudien har vi bland annat granskat twitterkanalen @swedens nyhetsflöde, dokumentet Sverigebilden har undersökts och en intervju gjorts med VisitSwedens head of Social media. Resultat: Undersökningen visar på ett nyanserat sätt hur man genom en twitterkanal kan marknadsföra ett land som varumärke och hur man använder sig av ambasadörer för att lyckas. VisitSweden visar på hur man genom förberedelse och kontroll kan få all Public relations att bli bra Public relations. Man har genom att vara tidig in i mediet på ett inovativt sätt kunna bryta mark och skapa intresse, men har är kanske inte lika öppna som man kan tro vid första anblick trots användandet av kuratorer. / Purpose: The projects purpose it to find out if the mediation has changed the work with Sweden as a brand. Issues: The main question this paper is based on is: How has the modern medialization changed VisitSweden's work with Sweden's brand? To answer the main question in a simpler way we will be using several sub queries as follows: What strategies does VisitSweden use to brand Sweden on Twitter? What are VisitSweden’s views on Social Medias? What does the image building look like on the Twitter channel @sweden when it comes to the brand Sweden? How has the use of curators democratized the work on the project Curators of Sweden? Theory: The theories in the essay are based on Nation branding, Public Diplomacy and Medialization with the weight on Public Diplomacy. Besides these theories the essay includes the theories of Public Relations and Public sphere that will be used to some extent. Method: The paper has investigated the Twitter channel @sweden's news flow through a quantitative and qualitative content analysis. It will also analyse the document Sverigebilden using a qualitative content analysis and document analysis, in the end, a qualitative interview with VisitSweden's Head of Social Media. Results: The survey reveals a nuanced way to which a Twitter channel can promote a country as a brand and how to utilise spokespersons to make it happen. VisitSweden shows how, through preparation and monitoring, all Public Relations can become good Public Relations. By being an early adopter of the medium, VisitSweden have been able to create interest through innovation and breaking new ground. It has since implemented a well controlled project that supports the brand through the use of core values that have been set in advance.

The once distinct roles of artist and curator have blurred dramatically in recent decades owing to a blending process in both directions, which has led to a turn towards the concept of the curator as producer and author, and the development of the hybridised figure of the ‘artist-curator’. Within my practice-based curatorial research at Meter Room and Grey Area, the 'artist-run space', as both form and content of space, is used as a critical framework for artist-curatorship. Artist-run spaces play a significant role in the cultural ecology of the UK, and this project explores the power relations involved in the production, distribution, and consumption of work within the field, in terms of both a cause and effect of a contested relationship with institutions and commercial galleries. Artist-run spaces are initiated for a number of reasons, but this project specifically focuses upon those spaces that identify with terms such as ‘independent’, 'alternative', ‘not-for-profit’, ‘DIY’, ‘self-organised’, and ‘critically engaged’. Using strategies for the development of a critical practice, such as Chantal Mouffe’s theories on ‘counter-hegemony’ and ‘agonistic space’ (2007), and Gerald Raunig's concept of 'instituent practice' (2009), this project explores how curatorial practices within artist-curator-run spaces might offer different ways of working, and be used to contest hegemonic structures within the field. I explore the role of critique within curatorial practice, specifically in relation to the struggle for autonomy, the production of subjectivity, and strategies for negating or resisting cooption by the New Institutions of post-Fordist neoliberalism. Three curatorial strategies were developed from experimental projects at both spaces, and then explored at Meter Room over a 2-year period. These strategies sought to occupy institutional structures in new ways: through the re-functioning of 'void' space, blending studio and gallery functions within a Curatorial Studio, developing a paracuratorial practice referred to as Caretaking, and re-approaching the concept of a collection-based institution through processes of layering works and their vestiges within an Artist-run Collection. The practice-based research culminated in a 5-month durational project in collaboration with five other artist-run spaces based in the West Midlands region, which explored a strategy for the creation of a new speculative artist-run institution as a dialogical process of instituting values through a critical curatorial practice.

A pesquisa definiu o processo de transição da curadoria ‘tradicional’, voltada para as atividades de conservação, organização, pesquisa e exposição das obras de arte, para a curadoria ‘contemporânea’, caracterizada pela organização da exposição através da elaboração de conceitos críticos formulados pelo curador, que desenvolve de forma autoral o tema da exposição e seleciona quais artistas irão participar da mostra. O período em que ocorreu esta transição foi na segunda metade do século XX, em sincronia com a arte contemporânea e o aumento do número de exposições, fato, este, decorrente da ampliação de espaços expositivos, visível em diversos países. A pesquisa buscou as origens da curadoria para perceber como a atividade foi se constituindo ao longo do tempo até chegar às características concernentes da curadoria ‘contemporânea’. Feito o levantamento sobre quais exposições se tornaram referenciais na arte contemporânea, foi elaborada uma análise para precisar as mudanças ocorridas no âmbito da curadoria, através da atuação de diferentes curadores. Entre eles, Harald Szeemann, Walter Zanini, Achille Bonito Oliva, Sheila Leirner, Jean-Hubert Martin e Paulo Herkenhoff. Concluídas as análises, foram apresentadas conside-rações sobre o curador enquanto autor de exposições, as relações entre a curadoria e os outros agentes do campo artístico e a curadoria como parte do processo de construção da história da arte. / The research has defined the transition process from the ‘traditional’ curatorship involved in conservation and organization activities, research and display of the art pieces to a ‘contemporary’ curatorship, characterized by the organization of the exhibition through the elaboration of critical concepts formulated by curator who develops in authorial way the theme of the exhibition and selects which artists will take part in it. This transition happened in the second half of the twentieth century, in synchronicity with the contemporary art and the increasing number of exhibitions, which derived from the increase of exhibition spaces, noticeable in many countries. The research searched the origins of the curatorship to perceive how the activity built up throughout the time until the concerning characteristics of contemporary curatorship were settled. After the assessment about which exhibitions became a reference was made, an analysis was elaborated to precise the changes in the scope of curatorship through the work of various curators. We can highlight among them: Harald Szeemann, Walter Zanini, Achille Bonito Oliva, Sheila Leirner, Jean- Hubert Martin and Paulo Herkenhoff. After the conclusion of the analysis, considerations about the curator as an author of the exhibitions were presented; the relationship between the curatorship and other agents of the artistic field and the curatorship as a part of the construction of Art history.

Thesis (PhD(Visual Studies))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references. Available on the Internet via the World Wide Web.

A pesquisa definiu o processo de transição da curadoria ‘tradicional’, voltada para as atividades de conservação, organização, pesquisa e exposição das obras de arte, para a curadoria ‘contemporânea’, caracterizada pela organização da exposição através da elaboração de conceitos críticos formulados pelo curador, que desenvolve de forma autoral o tema da exposição e seleciona quais artistas irão participar da mostra. O período em que ocorreu esta transição foi na segunda metade do século XX, em sincronia com a arte contemporânea e o aumento do número de exposições, fato, este, decorrente da ampliação de espaços expositivos, visível em diversos países. A pesquisa buscou as origens da curadoria para perceber como a atividade foi se constituindo ao longo do tempo até chegar às características concernentes da curadoria ‘contemporânea’. Feito o levantamento sobre quais exposições se tornaram referenciais na arte contemporânea, foi elaborada uma análise para precisar as mudanças ocorridas no âmbito da curadoria, através da atuação de diferentes curadores. Entre eles, Harald Szeemann, Walter Zanini, Achille Bonito Oliva, Sheila Leirner, Jean-Hubert Martin e Paulo Herkenhoff. Concluídas as análises, foram apresentadas conside-rações sobre o curador enquanto autor de exposições, as relações entre a curadoria e os outros agentes do campo artístico e a curadoria como parte do processo de construção da história da arte. / The research has defined the transition process from the ‘traditional’ curatorship involved in conservation and organization activities, research and display of the art pieces to a ‘contemporary’ curatorship, characterized by the organization of the exhibition through the elaboration of critical concepts formulated by curator who develops in authorial way the theme of the exhibition and selects which artists will take part in it. This transition happened in the second half of the twentieth century, in synchronicity with the contemporary art and the increasing number of exhibitions, which derived from the increase of exhibition spaces, noticeable in many countries. The research searched the origins of the curatorship to perceive how the activity built up throughout the time until the concerning characteristics of contemporary curatorship were settled. After the assessment about which exhibitions became a reference was made, an analysis was elaborated to precise the changes in the scope of curatorship through the work of various curators. We can highlight among them: Harald Szeemann, Walter Zanini, Achille Bonito Oliva, Sheila Leirner, Jean- Hubert Martin and Paulo Herkenhoff. After the conclusion of the analysis, considerations about the curator as an author of the exhibitions were presented; the relationship between the curatorship and other agents of the artistic field and the curatorship as a part of the construction of Art history.

A pesquisa definiu o processo de transição da curadoria ‘tradicional’, voltada para as atividades de conservação, organização, pesquisa e exposição das obras de arte, para a curadoria ‘contemporânea’, caracterizada pela organização da exposição através da elaboração de conceitos críticos formulados pelo curador, que desenvolve de forma autoral o tema da exposição e seleciona quais artistas irão participar da mostra. O período em que ocorreu esta transição foi na segunda metade do século XX, em sincronia com a arte contemporânea e o aumento do número de exposições, fato, este, decorrente da ampliação de espaços expositivos, visível em diversos países. A pesquisa buscou as origens da curadoria para perceber como a atividade foi se constituindo ao longo do tempo até chegar às características concernentes da curadoria ‘contemporânea’. Feito o levantamento sobre quais exposições se tornaram referenciais na arte contemporânea, foi elaborada uma análise para precisar as mudanças ocorridas no âmbito da curadoria, através da atuação de diferentes curadores. Entre eles, Harald Szeemann, Walter Zanini, Achille Bonito Oliva, Sheila Leirner, Jean-Hubert Martin e Paulo Herkenhoff. Concluídas as análises, foram apresentadas conside-rações sobre o curador enquanto autor de exposições, as relações entre a curadoria e os outros agentes do campo artístico e a curadoria como parte do processo de construção da história da arte. / The research has defined the transition process from the ‘traditional’ curatorship involved in conservation and organization activities, research and display of the art pieces to a ‘contemporary’ curatorship, characterized by the organization of the exhibition through the elaboration of critical concepts formulated by curator who develops in authorial way the theme of the exhibition and selects which artists will take part in it. This transition happened in the second half of the twentieth century, in synchronicity with the contemporary art and the increasing number of exhibitions, which derived from the increase of exhibition spaces, noticeable in many countries. The research searched the origins of the curatorship to perceive how the activity built up throughout the time until the concerning characteristics of contemporary curatorship were settled. After the assessment about which exhibitions became a reference was made, an analysis was elaborated to precise the changes in the scope of curatorship through the work of various curators. We can highlight among them: Harald Szeemann, Walter Zanini, Achille Bonito Oliva, Sheila Leirner, Jean- Hubert Martin and Paulo Herkenhoff. After the conclusion of the analysis, considerations about the curator as an author of the exhibitions were presented; the relationship between the curatorship and other agents of the artistic field and the curatorship as a part of the construction of Art history.

“The Artist as Curator: Diego Velázquez, 1623-1660” reconsiders the career of Diego Velázquez at the court of Hapsburg king Philip IV as a major episode in the history of curatorial practice. By this it means to examine the ways Velázquez’s activities as a painter and his activities as curator of the Hapsburg art collection transformed each other. Velázquez’s paintings express ambitions and attitudes towards his predecessors that would motivate Velázquez’s reorganization of parts of the royal collection that included their works. In turn, the collection and display of paintings in royal exhibition sites would cultivate in Velázquez a knowledge of art and its history that would inform the paintings he produced at court. Velázquez was a singularly art-historical painter, many of whose works investigate the nature of art itself. This dissertation seeks to prove that these aspects of Velázquez’s work were cultivated in the early modern museum that was the Alcázar palace, where he was surrounded by a veritable history of art under the Hapsburgs. The dissertation has five chapters; each closely examines a significant project in Velázquez’s trajectory as artist-curator at the Hapsburg court. The first uses the first major installation that Velázquez would witness at the Hapsburg court to set up the problematic of the dissertation as a whole - namely, that meaning was made on the walls of galleries, and that if Velázquez was going to make his name at court, it would be by engaging the royal art collection as it appeared on gallery walls. The second investigates Velázquez’s first curatorial project, the redecoration of the Octagonal Room; it argued that Velázquez’s interest in art itself—an interest characteristic of his painting practice—found a new medium in his work as curator of this gallery. The third chapter reexamines The Rokeby Venus as a function of what Velázquez witnessed over the course of the assembly of the Vaults of Titian, where paintings of nudes were exhibited all together; it thus demonstrates the impact of the royal art collection and its display on his creative imagination as a painter. The fourth chapter considers the culminating curatorial project of Velázquez’s career—the redecoration of the Hall of Mirrors—in tandem with the suite of paintings he made for it—the painting cycle including Mercury and Argus, examining the ways that these two projects mutually informed one another. The final chapter proposes that Las Meninas again evidences Velázquez’s curatorial and painterly imaginations at work simultaneously; then it uses the painting as a point of entry into the reception of both of these aspects of Velázquez’s work at the Hapsburg court, arguing that to make art after Velázquez was to acknowledge both. All together, these chapters tell the story of Velázquez’s increasing engagement with the royal art collection, from the start of his career at the Hapsburg court through his legacy beyond it.

In the second half of the nineteenth century and the first decades of the twentieth century the collecting of objects from colonized countries and their subsequent display in western museums was widespread throughout Western Europe. How and why these collections were made, the processes of collection, and by whom, has only recently begun to be addressed. This thesis is an exploration of the ethnographic collection of Gertrude Emily Benham (1867-1938) who made eight voyages independently around the world from 1904 until 1938, during which time she amassed a collection of approximately eight hundred objects, which she donated to Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery in 1935. It considers how and why she formed her collection and how, as a an amateur and marginalised collector, she can be located within discourses on ethnographic collecting. The thesis is organised by geographical regions in order to address the different contact zones of colonialism as well as to contextualise Benham within the cultural milieu in which she collected and the global collection of objects that she collected. An interdisciplinary perspective was employed to create a dialogue between anthropology, geography, museology, postcolonial and feminist theory to address the complex issues of colonial collecting. Benham is located within a range of intersecting histories: colonialism, travel, collecting, and gender. This study is the first in-depth examination of Benham as a collector and adds to the knowledge and understanding of Benham and her collection in Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery. It contributes to the discourse on ethnographic collectors and collecting and in doing so it acknowledges the agency and contribution of marginal collectors to resituate them as a central and intrinsic component in the formation of the ethnographic museum. In addition, and central to this, is the agency and role of indigenous people in forming ethnographic collections. The thesis offers a foundation for further research into women ethnographic collectors and a more nuanced and inclusive account of ethnographic collecting.