15 April – 15 May 2005
UKS

EXHIBITION
OPACITY

Current Considerations on Art Institutions and the Economy of Desire

This exhibition will explore in what way art institutions are used and challenged today within artistic processes.The starting point is the observation that institutions have changed after ‘institutional critique’ in the 70s as well as in the 90s. What could be the future impact of current critical tendencies? Today a critique is no more put against the institution in order to deconstruct it. Instead, a certain opacity, which has been criticized in the work of powerful institutions, can, on the other hand, be useful for smaller institutions in order to try out new forms of collaboration between different positions in the art field (artists, curators, academics or activists), and by this to create an alternative agenda for institutional work. The project is developed in a close collaboration between the curators and the artists. Therefore several workshops have been scheduled. The terms autonomy, freedom, internal process, uncertainty were discussed in relation to opacity. As well as the history of critical and affirmative work respectively within institutions: What happened in the 80s and 90s to institutional models in relation to notions of democracy? Only now the new forms of institutions of the 90s are at a point, where you can evaluate them, which was not possible five years ago.

The exhibition is not seen as the culmination point of these discussions, rather an integral part of an ongoing process. Considering the internal perspective of the artist as an involved teammate in cultural production, the question arises, how an art institution can be used from within – as an arena or a tool for repoliticization. Where lie the possibilities, and what do the presumable failures tell us about the societal role and reaching area of the diverse art institutions?

The exhibition will propose and discuss a collaborative and productive model, which researches current conditions of institutional work and develops alternative strategies – be they activist, appropriated, mocking, actual or purely utopian.

Participating artists: Kajsa Dahlberg, Stephan Dillemuth, Gardar Eide Einarsson, Markus Degerman, Sofie Thorsen, Danger Museum
Graphical concept: Halvor Bodin

April 15 – June 15, 2005 at UKS, Unge Kunsternes Samfund, Oslo.

Curators Nina Möntmann (NIFCA) and Trude Iversen (UKS).

Downloads:
Opacity_2005_Press.zip (0.4mb)
Opacity_2005_Production.zip (0.4mb)

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