Advanced Lecture and Open Research Workshop:
Ronald Kolb (curator, Artistic Director of M.1 at the Arthur Boskamp-Stiftung, Hohenlockstedt and lecturer of curatorial practice in continuing education at the Zurich University of the Arts at Zurich University of the Arts)
- 10:00 – 12:00 Advanced Lecture and Discussions
- 12:00 – 14:00 Lunch Break
- 14:00 – 16:00 Open Research Workshop
RONALD KOLB
POST-EXHIBITIONARY PRACTICES. FROM DISCIPLINARY POWER TO GOVERNMENTAL ASSEMBLAGES IN THE EXHIBITIONARY COMPLEX
(advanced lecture)
In my lecture, I will outline the changing infrastructural challenges in the exhibitionary complex. I will follow a shift in the curatorial discourse shaped by Foucault’s concept of disciplinary power (as prominently carried out by Tony Bennett) toward forms of non-institutionalised governing practices (‘governmentality’). This trajectory highlights how exhibiting may help open up active social spaces for negotiation and (self-)critical knowledge production within transversal contact zones – and how such spaces may open possibilities for emancipatory research in the spirit of situated knowledges.
RONALD KOLB
A RELATIONSHIP-ORIENTED VIEW OF EXHIBITION HISTORY
(open research workshop)
The workshop will follow loosely my analytical toolkit, designed to outline relational categories that enable the analysis of exhibitionary projects, both within and outside art institutions. What can be done with exhibitionary practice is taken to task by reconfiguring the notions of audience, art institutions, different cultural producers, the economic background and the infrastructural dimension that binds them all together.
Task for participants: please bring a picture of an exhibition view (historical or contemporary) showing exhibits, viewers and the spatial setting.
Biography
Dr. RONALD KOLB (PhD) is Artistic Director of M.1 at the Arthur Boskamp-Stiftung, Hohenlockstedt, for the 2025/26 cycle. As an independent curator, transdisciplinary researcher and lecturer, he focuses on curatorial practices at the intersection of art, knowledge and society. He teaches curatorial practice in continuing education at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) and is co-editor of the web journal On-Curating.org. In 2024, he completed his doctorate at the University of Reading with a dissertation entitled Curating as Governmental Practices. Post-exhibitionary Practices under Translocal Conditions in Governmental Constellations. A central feature of his work is the choreography of exhibitions and teaching formats as participatory spaces of knowledge. This is evident in the international events and exhibitions he has (co-)organised, including ‘Learning for Life,’ a festival and workshop programme for the Merz Academy Stuttgart (2018), ‘Situated Knowledges – Art and Curating on the Move,’ a digital event with Tai Kwun Contemporary, HK, and the Migros Museum (2021), the summer school ‘Commoning Curatorial and Artistic Education’ for documenta fifteen (2022), the study trip “Post-/Exhibitionary Practices: Art and Curating in Expanded Ecological Thought‘ and the international exhibition project ’Into the Rhythm“, a collaboration with the ARKO Art Center, Seoul, which also took place at the Gwangju Biennale 2024. His interdisciplinary approach combines curatorial research with experimental formats of mediation and promotes dialogue between art, theory and social practice.