Conference The Institutional Act

9. 5. 2013

© FG + SG Fotografia de Arquitectura

Conference The Institutional Act

9. 5. 2013

Institutions are power. They channel directions, focus attention. They are, without want of explanation, important. They are vessels that collect, exhibit, examine, support and critique. They are arbiters of taste, formers of knowledge. They are the dreamweavers of our cultural imagination.
 
But more than capturing and captivating, and as part of their economic and intellectual capacity, many contemporary institutions of architecture are producers. Those that don’t simply process and filter but are participating in a critical form of space-shaping. In the expanded field of architecture where architectural acts are beyond buildings, contemporary institutions are more at home amongst practitioners than critics.
 
The conference is part of a broader ongoing pursuit to define the interconnection between architecture and exhibition-making. It seeks to contribute to the debate about the developing practice of exhibiting architecture and the role of the institutions, which commission and frame contemporary discourse. It seeks to interrogate the formation of institutional knowledge and critique its direction.
 
Some of the strongest and most influential acts of institutions have lead to real political and social change. In complex political globalised times when cultural direction and investment is lacking from governments, and city’s become more autonomous and culture more lucrative, institutions are becoming more significant and their role more potent.
 
The conference attempts to negotiate these terrains and discuss the definition and role and remit of the contemporary architectural institution. 

The curator of the conference Beatrice Galilee is freelance curator, writer, critic, consultant and lecturer of contemporary architecture and design. Beatrice Galilee is the newly appointed Chief Curator for the 2013 Lisbon Architecture Triennale. She is the co-founder and director of The Gopher Hole, an exhibition and event space in London, architectural consultant and writer at DomusWeb, and associate lecturer at Central St Martins. She was a curator at the 2011 Gwangju Design Biennale in Korea, which was directed by Ai Wei Wei and Seung H-Sang, curator of the 2009 Shenzhen Hong Kong Bi-City Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism, directed by Ou Ning, she co-curated Convergence 142, an exhibition in Ordos, Inner Mongolia with Joseph Grima and was from 2006-2009 an Architecture Editor for Icon Magazine. In 2008 she won the IBP Architectural Journalist of the Year Award. Her writing has been published in a number of international magazines and books on architecture and design as well as mainstream newspapers.
 

Speakers:
Eva Franch i Gilabert
Storefront for Art and Architecture www.storefrontnews.org
Jan Boelen
Z33 House for contemporary Art www.z33.be
Kieran Long
Victoria & Albert Museum www.vam.ac.uk
Indy Johar
00:/ www.architecture00.net
Marielsa Castro
LIGA – Space for Architecture
 
Moderated by:
Beatrice Galilee www.beatricegalilee.com
 

Eva Franch i Gilabert is an architect, researcher, teacher and founder of the solo practice OOAA (Office of Architectural Aff  airs). She is currently the Executive Director and chief Curator of Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York, a space dedicated to research in architecture, art and design.

Jan Boelen is founder and artistic director of the Art Museum Z33 in Hasselt (Belgium) and is the head of the Master Department Social Design at the Design Academy Eindhoven. He is chairman of the committee for Architecture and Design of the Flemish Community. On the initiative of Jan Boelen and Z33 Manifesta 9 was organised in Belgium in 2012.

Kieran Long is senior curator of contemporary architecture, design and digital at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. He was architecture critic at the London Evening Standard and former editor-in-chief of Architects’ Journal and Architectural Review. He was assistant director of 2012 Venice Architecture Biennale.

Indy Johar is a co-founder of 00:/, an architect and regeneration consultant with particular experience in socially driven sustainability. Organisation 00:/ is working on a range of social interventions from the design of new institutions such as Hub Westminster to the radical redesign of community infrastructures – such as Libraries and Schools.

Marielsa Castro is an architect and executive director of LIGA, Space for Architecture in Mexico City. She is in charge of the general coordination and management of the exhibition platform. LIGA was established to promote the exchange of ideas and investigation on contemporary architectural practice in Latin America.

Beatrice Galilee is curator, writer, critic, consultant and lecturer of contemporary architecture and design. She is the newly appointed Chief Curator for the 2013 Lisbon Architecture Triennale. She is the co-founder and director of The Gopher Hole, an exhibition and event space in London, architectural critic at Domus, and associate lecturer at Central St Martins Colleague of Art and Design. She curated “Hacked” at the 2012 Milan design week and was senior curator at the 2011 Gwangju Design Biennale in Korea, directed by Ai Wei Wei and Seung H-Sang. In 2009 she was a European curator of the 2009 Shenzhen Hong Kong Bi-City Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism, directed by Ou Ning. Her writing has been published in a number of international magazines and books on architecture and design, from 2006-2009 she was an Architecture Editor for Icon Magazine.

Videos of the conference
The lectures of the conference has been supported by Videolectures.net.

Partners of the conference

 
Ministry of Infrastructure and Spatial Planning

Oris Magazine


British Council Slovenia
 
Videosponsor


Videolectures.net

 

Opening

9 am-5 pm

 

Admission

10 € / 5 € (students). Payment: MAO ticket office or bank account: 01100-6000034749, Bank: UJP, SWIFT code: BSLJSI2X, Note: »Simpozij MAO«.

Application form, send to More detailed programme

 

Organization

Curated by Beatrice Galilee.

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