Below are a few of the opening paragraphs of an essay I recently wrote after a recent trip to visit various Biennales in Korea and China with Okwui Enwezor. Of course, this is not the full essay. There are about 11 more pages that discuss the Gwuangju Biennale in more detail, but I did not post those pages here.
There is no doubt about it. We are in the age of full-on globalization. Old notions of autonomous nation-states crumple under the pressures of transnational identities and global exchange. Okwui Enwezor makes the important point that, while globalization is nothing new, the current speed and scale at which globalization now unfolds is unprecedented.[2] In the field of contemporary art, a result of this new global structure is the emergence of a new curatorial method that makes global discourse and exchange its purpose. New curatorial projects that demonstrate this curatorial strategy are popping up around the globe. These projects aim to create dialectical spaces for heterogeneous ideas to flourish in a manner that simultaneously encourages solidarity between disparate geographical and socio-political locals while promoting the fluid exchange of ideas. As it asserts that the subject is only realized through interaction or dialogue with that which is outside of itself, and that synthesis grows out of the paradoxes and antinomies inherent in disparate subjectivities, the new curatorial model articulates the structure of the Hegelian dialectic.
The basic structure of Hegel’s dialectic includes three sequential terms: thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. Within this framework, paradox and contradiction become the basis for the realization of subjectivity[3]. Through an interaction with its antithesis, the thesis becomes alienated from itself. The paradox between thesis and antithesis is resolved via the process of synthesis, which then operates as the springboard on which to base a new thesis.[4] According to this model, subjectivity is neither autonomous nor static, but relational and dynamic, constantly in conversation with the outside world. The thesis (or subject) gains its subjectivity in relation to that which is outside of itself. It is this dialectical framework that is realized by 21st century curators as a means to explore the current state of globalism. The dialectical structure is employed as a means by which to encourage dialogue. This essay will present examples of this dialectic and subsequent dialogue within the 7th Gwuangju Biennale, “Annual Report.”
In the 7th Gwuangju Biennale, "Annual Report," the most significant discursive mode is reflection because, as posed by Okwui Enwezor, the artistic director of the exhibition, “in providing such a reflexive site for the presentation of contemporary art, Gwuangju Biennale has today assumed a dialectical position in debates focused on the task of reorienting the role of cultural and institutional networks of cotemporary art.”[5] The act of reflection makes it possible to explore paradoxical ideas within the context of 21st century globalism and globalization.
The following paragraphs explore modes of reflection as the crux of the new dialectical and dialogical curatorial model.
The first mode of reflection is historical. Due to its origins as an event specifically created for the commemoration of the student uprising that occurred in Gwuangju in 1980, the Gwuangju Biennale enters into a site-specific mode of historical reflection. Curators of the Gwuangju Biennale face the task of engaging the dialectic between the local and the global, the past and the present. They must find the intersection between the specificity of Korea’s tumultuous democratization movement and the more universal 21st century conversation on the topic of globalization. In their exploration of this dialectic between past and present, local and global, the curators aim to create a discursive atmosphere among Korean citizens within and across generations as well as between Koreans and the foreigners who might visit the exhibition. The Gwuangju portion of the “position paper,” Spring, curated by Claire Tancons, enables this historical reflection.....
There is no doubt about it. We are in the age of full-on globalization. Old notions of autonomous nation-states crumple under the pressures of transnational identities and global exchange. Okwui Enwezor makes the important point that, while globalization is nothing new, the current speed and scale at which globalization now unfolds is unprecedented.[2] In the field of contemporary art, a result of this new global structure is the emergence of a new curatorial method that makes global discourse and exchange its purpose. New curatorial projects that demonstrate this curatorial strategy are popping up around the globe. These projects aim to create dialectical spaces for heterogeneous ideas to flourish in a manner that simultaneously encourages solidarity between disparate geographical and socio-political locals while promoting the fluid exchange of ideas. As it asserts that the subject is only realized through interaction or dialogue with that which is outside of itself, and that synthesis grows out of the paradoxes and antinomies inherent in disparate subjectivities, the new curatorial model articulates the structure of the Hegelian dialectic.
The basic structure of Hegel’s dialectic includes three sequential terms: thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. Within this framework, paradox and contradiction become the basis for the realization of subjectivity[3]. Through an interaction with its antithesis, the thesis becomes alienated from itself. The paradox between thesis and antithesis is resolved via the process of synthesis, which then operates as the springboard on which to base a new thesis.[4] According to this model, subjectivity is neither autonomous nor static, but relational and dynamic, constantly in conversation with the outside world. The thesis (or subject) gains its subjectivity in relation to that which is outside of itself. It is this dialectical framework that is realized by 21st century curators as a means to explore the current state of globalism. The dialectical structure is employed as a means by which to encourage dialogue. This essay will present examples of this dialectic and subsequent dialogue within the 7th Gwuangju Biennale, “Annual Report.”
In the 7th Gwuangju Biennale, "Annual Report," the most significant discursive mode is reflection because, as posed by Okwui Enwezor, the artistic director of the exhibition, “in providing such a reflexive site for the presentation of contemporary art, Gwuangju Biennale has today assumed a dialectical position in debates focused on the task of reorienting the role of cultural and institutional networks of cotemporary art.”[5] The act of reflection makes it possible to explore paradoxical ideas within the context of 21st century globalism and globalization.
The following paragraphs explore modes of reflection as the crux of the new dialectical and dialogical curatorial model.
The first mode of reflection is historical. Due to its origins as an event specifically created for the commemoration of the student uprising that occurred in Gwuangju in 1980, the Gwuangju Biennale enters into a site-specific mode of historical reflection. Curators of the Gwuangju Biennale face the task of engaging the dialectic between the local and the global, the past and the present. They must find the intersection between the specificity of Korea’s tumultuous democratization movement and the more universal 21st century conversation on the topic of globalization. In their exploration of this dialectic between past and present, local and global, the curators aim to create a discursive atmosphere among Korean citizens within and across generations as well as between Koreans and the foreigners who might visit the exhibition. The Gwuangju portion of the “position paper,” Spring, curated by Claire Tancons, enables this historical reflection.....
...........
The Gwuangju Biennale is certainly not the only articulation of the new dialectical curatorial strategy taking hold across the globe. Anton Vidokle’s project, Night School is an artistic project in the form of a temporary school that takes place at the New Museum. Night School is a year of monthly seminars that “use the museum as a site to shape a critically engaged public through art discourse.” The project itself is the creation of discursive space. A newer project, Museum as Hub, is the collaborative project of five arts institutions around the world (Insa Art Space, South Korea; Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico; Townhouse Gallery of Contemporary Art, Egypt; and Van Abbemuseum, The Netherlands). Museum as Hub offers this statement as the banner on its website homepage: “Museum as Hub is an international partnership of arts organizations considering the role of contemporary art and how to engage audiences around the world, encouraging critical discourse and exploration of artistic practice,” and then, “Hub partners will commission artists significant to their institutional goals to address the subject with a focus on discursive and interactive projects.” Third, the Long March Project exemplifies the discursive curatorial strategy. The founder and organizer of the project describes the project as
"a complex, multi-platform, international arts organization and ongoing art project, that can be simultaneously considered a curatorial lab; a publishing house; an artistic collection; a meeting place; a gallery space; a consultancy; a commissioning and production atelier; artistic facilitator; and author. From a critical distance, all of these avenues of production aim to provocatively construct, and in turn renew, presumed action and thinking concerning ‘contemporary art’." [13]
this is not the end of the essay, but I am not going to post the rest, because I've already posted too much. I have audio footage of an interview with the founder of the Long March Project, in China. Once I edit this footage, I will post it here.
[3] Kim O’Connor, “Dialectic,” University of Chicago School of Media Theory,
Keywords Glossary Project, 2003, (accessed October 16, 2008).
[3] Kim O’Connor, “Dialectic,” University of Chicago School of Media Theory,
Keywords Glossary Project, 2003,
[5] Enwezor, Okwui, “The Politics of Spectacle,” in the 7th Gwuangju Biennale exhibition
catalogue, edited by Okwui Enwezor, 34. Korea: Gwuangju Biennale Foundation and BOM (Books on the Move), 2008.
[6] Tancons, Claire. “Spring.” In the 7th Gwuangju Biennale exhibition catalogue, edited by
Okwui Enwezor, 349. Korea: Gwuangju Biennale Foundation and BOM (Books on the Move), 2008.
[11] Sung Hyen Park, “Bokdukbang Project,” in the 7th Gwuangju Biennale exhibition catalogue, edited by Okwui Enwezor, 324. Korea: Gwuangju Biennale Foundation and BOM (Books on the Move), 2008.
[12] Hoskote, Ranjit. “Scales of Elaboration,” In the 7th Gwuangju Biennale exhibition
catalogue, edited by Okwui Enwezor, (47). Korea: Gwuangju Biennale Foundation and BOM (Books on the Move), 2008.
[13] The Long March Project homepage (accessed on October 17, 2008). >
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