Eoin Dara (Head of Exhibitions, Dundee Contemporary Arts, UK)
Júlia Rebouças (independent curator, São Paulo, Brazil)
Nicolaus Schafhausen (Artistic Director, Munich Documentation Centre for the History of National Socialism, Germany)
Elif Shafak (author and activist, London, UK)
Chair: Liam Gillick (artist, New York, USA)
The Bauhaus closed in 1933, due to pressure from Germany’s National Socialist government. From Barcelona, São Paulo, Vienna and Istanbul to the UK, resurgent populist and nationalist currents have birthed deeply felt conversations and conflicts over freedom of expression, minority representation and art’s responsibility to wider society. In the second annual CAS Curatorial Summit, held in partnership with the Contemporary Art Society (CAS), leading curators, artists and activists discuss strategies and opportunities for resistance.
Nicolaus Schafhausen is an internationally distinguished curator, director and educator. He was the curator of the German Pavilion for the 52nd and 53rd Venice Biennale, and for the 56th Venice Biennale in 2015 he curated the Kosovo Pavilion. He was the co-curator of the 6th Moscow Biennale 2015. Since 2011 he has been the Strategic Director of Fogo Island Arts, an initiative of the Canadian Shorefast Foundation to find alternative solutions for the revitalisation of the area that is prone to emigration. Schafhausen has extensive experience leading renowned institutions such as the Frankfurter Kunstverein, the Künstlerhaus Stuttgart, and the Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art in Rotterdam. Schafhausen was the Director of Kunsthalle Wien until March 2019 (he resigned citing the resurgence of the extreme right in Austria) and is currently artistic director of the Munich Documentation Centre for the History of National Socialism.
Júlia Rebouças is a curator, researcher and critic. She was a curator at the Instituto Inhotim from 2007 to 2015. She was co-curator of the 32nd Sao Paolo Biennial in 2016. She recently curated the 36th Panorama of Brazilian Art at the Modern Art Museum (MAM) in Sao Paolo (on view through November 2019) and is the co-curator of Entrevedo by Cildo Meireles: An invitation to States of Attention, the largest ever exhibition on Mereiles in Latin America at the SESC Pompeia, in Sao Paolo (on view through February 2020).
Elif Shafak is an award-wining author. She moved to London 10 years ago with her husband and two children after another novel, The Bastard of Istanbul, led to a trial for “insulting Turkishness” (she was eventually acquitted). Her latest novel has been seized along with two earlier books and is being examined by the Turkish authorities for “crimes of obscenity”.Her latest book, 10 Minutes 38 seconds in this Strange World, is shortlisted for the 2019 Booker Prize. Shafak who has been awarded the title of Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres, is also a political scientist and an academic. She holds a degree in International Relations, a masters’ degree in Gender and Women’s Studies and a PhD in Political Science and Political Philosophy. She has taught at various universities in Turkey, the UK and the USA, including St Anne's College, Oxford University, where she is an honorary fellow.
Liam Gillick is an internationally exhibited conceptual artist based in New York. His work is in many public collections and since 1997, he is in the faculty of Columbia University. His exhibition, ‘The Night of Red and Gold’, is on view at Maureen Paley, London, until 17th November, 2019.