Back to the Individual Experience: Some Thoughts on Research and Curatorial Practice in Contemporary

In this talk, Liu Ding and Carol Yinghua Lu will explore the notion of curating and art criticism as an artistic practice. Citing the two exhibitions that the pair have been working on, ‘Little Movements: Self-practice in Contemporary Art’ and ‘Accidental Message: Art is Not a System, Not a World’, the 7th Shenzhen Sculpture Biennale that opens on 12 May, they propose a model for curatorial and art criticism practice from the perspective of creative subjects and individual practitioners. Reflecting on a tendency of curatorial practice and art theory writing to occupy a higher position in the hierarchy of the art system, Liu and Yinghua will analyse the reciprocal relationship and mutual dependency between artistic practice and art theory and curatorial practice, both being crucial to the initiation of the other. They will also draw attention to the importance of re-discovering practice before it is summarised as part of a certain ‘movement’ or becomes theoreticised.

Liu Ding was born in 1976 in Changzhou, Jiangsu Province. He is an artist and curator based in Beijing. Liu’s conceptual art project 'Liu Ding’s Store', begun in 2008, is a continuing project that discusses and presents the various visible and invisible mechanisms in the art system for the formation of value. Liu was chosen in 2009 as a representative of China at the 53rd Venice Biennale. 'Little Movements: Self-Practices in Contemporary Art', the project he and Carol Yinghua Lu initiated and curated together, was exhibited at the OCT Contemporary Art Terminal in Shenzhen in September 2011, and will go on an international tour from 2012. Liu is also the co-curator of the 7th Shenzhen Sculpture Biennale, 2012. His works have been exhibited in numerous art institutions including the Turner Museum and the Arnolfini Gallery in the UK, the Kunsthalle Wien in Austria, the Astrup Fearnley Modern Art Museum in Norway, the São Paolo National Museum of Art in Brazil, the Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe, Germany, the RasquArt Center in Switzerland, Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo in Italy, the Seoul Municipal Museum of Art in Korea, the Luggage Store Gallery in San Francisco, the Iberia Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing, the Shanghai Contemporary Museum of Art, and the Guangdong Museum of Art in Guangzhou, China.
 
Carol Yinghua Lu was born in Chaozhou, Guangdong Province in 1977. She is a critic and curator based in Beijing. Yinghua graduated from the critical studies programme of Malmö Art Academy at Sweden’s Lund University in 2005 and served as a China Researcher for Asia Art Archive from 2005 to 2007. She is currently a contributing editor at Frieze, a London-based art magazine, and sits on the editorial board for the Arnolfini Art Center’s Far West magazine. She also writes essays on contemporary art research for many international art magazines, catalogues, and publications. She was a jury member for the 2011 Venice Biennale’s Golden Lion Award, and is one of the co-artistic directors for the 2012 Gwangju Biennial. Little Movements: Self-Practices in Contemporary Art, the project she and Liu Ding initiated and curated together, was exhibited at the OCT Contemporary Art Terminal in Shenzhen in September 2011, and will go on an international tour from 2012. Lu is the co-curator of the 7th Shenzhen Sculpture Biennale.

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