Abstract

Chimurenga (via Wendell Hassan Marsh) offers the following statement to practitioners of history and memory: “History is the science of the state, while memory is the art of the stateless.” This presentation will reflect on recent research in exhibition studies, considering divergent modes of historicization, archiving, and historiography. With a focus on recent work conducted within the framework of ‘art becoming public’ with colleagues who are part of the Exhibition Histories project at Afterall Research Centre and a wider group of collaborators, I will explore the potentials of a ‘materialist’ approach – invested in the materiality of art and bodies in space, as well as the material conditions of their socio-political realities – and speculative practices of memory.

Bio

David Morris  is Research Fellow and Editor at Afterall Research Centre at the University of the Arts London and Managing Editor of Afterall’s Exhibition Histories program of research, events, and publications, which is developed in association with Asia Art Archive; the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College; and the Faculty of Fine, Applied, and Performing Arts at the University of Gothenburg. With Helena Vilalta, he leads the research masters’ course MRes Art: Exhibition Studies at Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London. His publications include Artist-to-Artist: Independent Art Festivals in Chiang Mai 1992–98 (edited with David Teh, Afterall Books, 2018) and Schizo-Culture: The Event, The Book (edited with Sylvère Lotringer, Semiotexte, 2014). He has organized exhibitions and symposia, and has published, taught, and lectured widely.