In the lead-up to Kunstverein München’s bicentenary in 2023, the institution hosted three iterations of a Summer School entitled The Stories We Tell Ourselves, which began in 2021 and explored alternative forms of collective knowledge production and negotiated the concept of an institution intended for the public. For the 2022 iteration, over 40 students, artist, and cultural practitioners came together to work with guest lecturers and the curatorial team on four topics — Architecture, City and Archive, Exhibition History, and Publishing—within the context of the institution’s archive.
During the day, the working groups engaged in communal learning processes. In the evenings, further approaches and questions were presented and discussed in formats including lectures, discussion rounds, and screenings.
Exhibition History: Curating and the Politics of Care
with Kirsten Lloyd, Gloria Hasnay (Kunstverein München), Ima-Abasi Okon and Luiza Proecnça
The working group focused on the art institution in general, and the Kunstverein in particular, as a site for feminist intervention. Considering key debates and case studies, we will examine the conflictual relationship between institutions, archives, and feminist thought, the ways in which feminism has been represented through exhibition-making as well as experimental and disruptive tactics. Together, we discussed exemplary exhibitions, collectively read texts, and developed a set of proposals for the Kunstverein designed to help us to think through what kind of art infrastructures and curatorial strategies are required to support feminist struggle in the 21st century.
