ARTH 649 Curatorial Practice: Theory and Practice Asian Indigenous | Curating Hospitality

• Tursdays, 11:00 am-2:00 pm
  
• EV 3.760
• Instructor: Dr. Alice Ming Wai Jim

This seminar examines methodological issues in curating contemporary exhibitions of Asian Indigenous relationalities. The rubric ‘Asian Indigenous’ is taken to refer to the historical and present-day connections between Asian/Asian diasporic and Indigenous peoples across the globe as well as to describe Indigenous peoples of Asia writ large and peoples of mixed Asian-Indigenous heritage. The fall 2022 semester will focus on the Asia Pacific—including Hawai`i, the Pacific Islands, Oceania, Samoa, and New Zealand. Drawing from global art histories, curatorial studies, and critical race museology, the seminar’s main premise that curating hospitality is a political practice of (mis)care and therefore subject to constant critical scrutiny; the intention is to design, develop, and otherwise recognize the appropriate tools to embed continuous reflexivity, or feedback loops. Consider just some of the topics explored by award-winning interdisciplinary Samoan artist Yuki Kihara, as the first artist from New Zealand to present at La Biennale di Venezia who is Pasifika, Asian and Fa’afafine: “Small island ecologies, climate change, queer rights, Gauguin’s gaze, intersectionality and decolonization” (Biennale Arte 2022).

The fall 2022 seminar will focus on the 59th Venice Biennale (April 23 through November 27) to examine the Asia Pacific in the global art world. As part of NYU’s GAX 2022 (Global Asia/Pacific Art Exchange) in Venice, Dr. Jim’s seminar will be held in conjunction with graduate seminars at Rutgers University, New York University, and AUT University, Aotearoa. In addition to pre-recorded content produced especially for this session, students will have access to live stream video of the scheduled international symposium from Venice, and opportunities to participate in online remote workshops and develop transnational peer relationships and projects. Open to MA and PhD students.