Fellow Field: Curating

A conversation with Eirini Fountedaki and Kyveli Mavrokordopoulou on curatorial practice

By Eva Vaslamatzi

Eva Vaslamatzi

I wanted to have this discussion altogether because I think we share a lot in common in our curatorial practice, even though we deal with different topics and mediums. Something that struck me as I was reviewing the material you both sent me in advance of this conversation is the concept of the expert, which interests me personally.

Kyveli Mavrokordopoulou

The concept of scientific expertise interests me a lot too. With the issues I deal with, which amongst other things concern very technical knowledge about nuclear waste and their storage, the concept of expertise plays a significant role. The uncertainty posed by nuclear waste that remains toxic for millions of years completely challenges the possibility of such expertise completely. Such complex systems with the fundamental uncertainty they entail, somehow force us into a form of interdisciplinarity. I come to the projects I organize from the field of art history and enter into discussion with a biologist or a chemical engineer, and what we have to offer to the discussion is equal. These are the moments when the hierarchy of knowledge is leveled by the uniqueness of the problem.

Eirini Fountedaki

And how do you think about the concept of expertise in relation to curatorial practices?

K.M.

I feel that the concept of expertise is, in this case too, futile. For example, as I prepared for the workshop “Nuclear Polders” I am organizing this May with artist Agnès Villette, for the arts organization Sonic Acts (Amsterdam) on nuclear plant built on reclaimed land, I learned from an activist about what is happening in Gravelines, France: aging nuclear infrastructures are being threatened by imminent water-level rising brought on by climate change. This is also happening on coastlines in the Netherlands (Borssele) and Belgium (Doel). Based on discussions about this, the curatorial idea emerged. Also, I organize tours in nuclear facilities, which I perceive as a form of curatorial practice. I mean, this exchange and interdisciplinarity, or being part of a group, is essential for my practice. And this is the opposite of the curator as expert.

E.V.

I think that the notion of the curator as expert does not make sense due to the nature of this job. It is a topic that you can study, but you actually learn it through practice. It also consists of so many things, it’s hard to define it in a sentence. And it is as if there is a gap that curators are often trying to fill by bringing in people from other specialties in the process, accepting their own limitations.

E.F.

I believe that curating can at least promote a different epistemological approach, because the academy has specific methodological tools and a very specific vocabulary. So, I think curating is this “gray zone” where you can invite people who represent a kind of embodied knowledge. Thinking of the film series “Residing in the Borderlands” (2019–2020) that I co-edited with Pia Chakraverti-Würthwein at SAVVY Contemporary (Berlin) I remember that we wanted to get away from the idea of a ​​(film) expert and of who can talk about a film. We wanted to recreate a map of Berlin, talking about the different paths that Berlin communities have taken since the fall of the wall, exploring the stories of different diasporic communities. We felt the guests we invited were experts in their own way, because they had experienced things that academics usually know through books. We had approached, amongst others, a Palestinian who has had a falafel truck near the SAVVY building for thirty years and the Vietnamese-German filmmaker Angelika Nguyen that had grown up in East Berlin and experienced its transition. For me, curating can change the idea we have of who qualifies as an expert, and who has the right to speak on specific issues.

K.M.

Let me also say that in the field of art we sometimes have an outdated view of what the academia is. One of the reasons I started thinking about the importance of mainstream knowledge is through the academic work of geographer Shilol Krupar, which is a reference for me. Especially a book she wrote in 2013 called “Hot Spotter’s Report. Military Fables of Toxic Waste” which looks at the chemical and radiotoxic remains of cold war military nuclear production. The narrator constantly switches between different personae, fictional and real, and tells the story of these sites through different positions (as a researcher, as a nuclear scientist, as a drag queen) that activates a queer narrative. There are increasingly links between academia and more curatorial approaches to an issue.

E.V.

Since you mentioned it, as I read the text you co-authored with Agnes Vilette in 2021 titled “Nuclear Polders in Limbo” (Sonic Arts Magazine, forthcoming) I was wondering about the role that narrative plays in your writings. As the subject you are working with is quite specialized and has complex terminology, I guess that you have to find a way to pass the story on to the reader. And this can’t be done in academic terms.

K.M.

For me too, to move on to a theoretical level or to think of terms that express the complexity at work in nuclear landscapes, I need to go through narrative, as a mode of meaning production. The text you mentioned describes the moment we arrived with Agnes at a huge nuclear facility outside Dunkirk, in Gravelines, France and our first impressions and feelings upon arriving. For example, we were walking in the sand and we had this feeling of holidays by the beach and when we turned around we saw six nuclear reactors. To share this experience as an entry point in my subject is much more important than to start with historical information, to the extent that these issues have been monopolized by scientific discourse. Especially in Dunkirk where such issues create emotions and bring communities into conflict, a situation that transcends science and is positioned as a reality inside the community.

E.V.

It is important both for ourselves and the public to make things accessible and understandable; it’s the curator’s responsibility. A film is probably more accessible as a medium than contemporary art, and so are books. You are both working a lot with the medium of publication. Eirini, I had read an excerpt in which you state that you perceive a publication as a continuation of an event.

E.F.

Yes. Take for example the publication “How Does the World Breathe Now? Film as witness, archive, and political tool” (Archive Books, SAVVY Books, 2021). For me, this book went beyond its role to record what has happened and actually took some of the themes that had emerged from the eponymous film series (September 2016-March 2018, co-directed by Elena Agudio, Antonia Alampi and Pia Chakraverti-Würthwein, and initiated by Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung) and took them one step further. Some of those we invited to participate in the publication were not part of the film series but we felt that they could potentially talk about the topics that had already been raised. So, the publication can in itself be a curatorial work that can continue a theme in another form. I do not understand the publication only as an archive. For me it is a project in itself. Kyveli, were the publications you have edited standalone editions or were they related to a program?

K.M.

I have usually worked on publications as standalone projects, as opposed to using them as continuations of existing ones. Both publications I made, “Nuclear Aesthetics” (2018) and “Hot Pictures” (2021), were openings to something else as it was a way for me to enter into dialogue with a circle of people I’m still talking to today. In our project “Nuclear Polders” with Agnes we have been very concerned with the idea of ​​restitution. We had collected discussions with various people — a fisherman who was involved in a scandal of toxic fish served at a restaurant in Dunkirk, an activist belonging to groups formed in post-Chernobyl France, a former worker and students from the School of Fine Arts of Dunkirk — along with photographs and sound recordings. As an artist, Agnes suggested that we do an installation but I too had difficulty in projecting all this information into something three-dimensional. It was much easier for me to imagine making a publication.

E.V.

Since you mention this relationship with Agnes, I would like to hear more about the collaborations you both have in your practices with other curators or artists. You have both been very involved with this, as well as with collective writing and participating in reading groups, etc.

E.F.

Personally, I do not enjoy the process of doing things on my own because I usually learn a lot less that way. But in my case I think it has to do with the fact that I am also allergic to the idea of ​​the figure of the curator who wants to get all the attention. I mostly see us as intermediaries. I like to learn to let things take shape with influences from many different practices and backgrounds, and I also like when responsibilities are shared based on everyone’s strengths. For example, I’m part of the Berlin-based Cruising Curators collective, in which each of us has a different expertise. When we write a text collectively it takes a form after so many back and forths that I could not have imagined had I written it myself. We started as a reading group, and became friends. During the pandemic we wanted to read and think together and later we decided to make this private experience public.

K.M.

I have also had regular companions, two or three people that I met at the beginning of my doctorate and the dialogue that took different forms emerged effortlessly. Through this collaboration, I believe that something very different emerges in terms of quality. Concerning collective writing we invent ways and working methodologies. For example, in our text “Nuclear Polders in Limbo” with Agnes we started by sending word lists to each other and little by little the text was formed. It was very interesting because although a list categorizes, it is not a closed system and is never really complete. However,I must say that the labor market and system are still organized around this romantic idea of ​​the artist as an individual, the aching hero that creates on their own.

E.F.

However, this idea of ​​the curator working alone is very false. That is, if you look even in institutions, sometimes a large part of the work is done by the assistant curator, the one who does curatorial research, those who literally set up the exhibition (art handling), and many other people-mediators in the process, but hierarchically most credits are taken by the curator. I find it useful for someone to try to resist this logic, and to record as equal partners all the people who helped to shape both the idea itself and its implementation.

E.V.

It’s interesting to see that what we discuss so far is somehow linked to this question of the “right” credits and the labor system. The impossibility of the expert in our field, the importance of interdisciplinarity and collaborations, as well as the exploration of different forms for curatorial practice outside the traditional exhibition format that promote the figure of the successful curator. Before the end of the discussion, I would like each of you to tell me in two words how you perceive your curatorial practice.

E.F.

It has a lot to do with the background with which one enters into curating. I come from a musical background and I think first through the sound and then visually, so the term “curator of visual art” seems very restrictive to me. Even when I make an exhibition it has to do with media that evolve over time, like videos or an audio project that is more “Intangible” and addresses different senses beyond sight. Curating has to do for me with how we perceive time. But also, I believe that we should be aware that we are building a narrative through our practice. It’s like a playground for politics.

K.M.

I see curating as a form of research that gives me different tools to pursue what I do as an academic researcher. Also, it opens up another audience, beyond what I usually address and it activates connections. Curating gives us the opportunity to open up to other fields and people that we would not otherwise do, on freer terms.

Eirini Fountedaki (SNF ARTWORKS Curatorial Fellow 2020) is an independent curator and writer based in Athens and Berlin.

Kyveli Mavrokordopoulou (SNF ARTWORKS Curatorial Fellow 2020) is art historian, critic, and curator.

Eva Vaslamatzi (SNF ARTWORKS Curatorial Fellow 2019) is an independent curator and writer currently based in Athens, Greece.

Dialogue one: when we talked about chance and intuition

It is not often the case that we, as curators, get to reflect on each other’s practice through an open and public conversation. Even less so it happens with someone who, perhaps by mere chance, shares a deep interest (may I dare say love?) for the complex relationship between Greece and Turkey. When I decided to approach Eva Vaslamatsi, emerging curator now based between Athens and Syros after a Parisian experience, maybe I had exactly that idea of chance in mind or rather let’s call it intuition, as this keyword came up multiple times in our dialogue.

Intuition as a method?
Can we go that far? Possibly… Or at least to some extent.
It is certainly a key element of what we do, but what would that actually mean?

Intuition to capture a specific narrative, a tale, written within a space, which needs unearthing? to turn an emotion or a feeling into a complex story? to assemble the thoughts and voices of the artists we encounter into multi-layered discourses?

Each of these elements seem to come together when talking with Eva about her practice.

So, if it’s a method, is it something you learn?

When I ask where this intuition comes from, I am glad to hear that we agree it is not some innate gift but rather a combination of observation skills and attention to details. At this point of our discussion Eva adds that her early passion for photography and moving image, which she developed during her art studies, probably plays a big role as it does train your eye and brain to think through associations, juxtapositions, and synergy or contrast between two images. But what ultimately drew her to pursuing a career in curating is the crucial additional element of the physicality of the works and the ability to respond to a particular space by creating immersive experiences.

Dialogue two: when we talked about curatorial research and how projects start

We started this conversation by chatting about our different academic background soon realising how little this matter in the wider picture but, nevertheless it does give some hints as to how we develop our projects. And in this regard, it was fascinating to hear Eva talk about how, every project starts as an instinctive reaction to a stimulus rather than from a deep and long research into something. This can be a book, a particular space, something suggested, or a fortuitous encounter of works like in her project “La nuit juste avant le forête”. The project, which she developed together with three fellow artists and curators¹ while at Doc! in Paris, was a collective exhibition responding to previous shows in which each curator would bring one work which they had developed a relation to or that they felt would synergize with each other’s sensitivities and interests. Eva described this as just one of those occasions in which intuition guides us to create interesting and unforeseen experiences.

So what if we think of this curiosity, the openness to the world as an additional piece of the “method” puzzle?

Maybe. maybe that is itself our “deep research” in itself…

While I share the fascination for this kind of projects, I do think that this is not a reaction against research-based practices per se but very much the consequence of an overall institutional system which often demands this kind of readiness to react. As a matter of fact her more recent focus on folklore feels like it might just turn into one of those lengthy, complex and rich researches which influences her projects for years to come.

The passion with which she talks about her experience at Doc!, especially considering the more institutional position she held at the time, as assistant curator at Palais de Tokyo, is really telling of her love for hands on projects and for an understanding and care of an exhibition as a collective effort rather than a task to fulfill, something which we both agree sadly is often missing in projects these days.

Dialogue three: on how we talked about Paris and institutions

The time Eva spent in Paris was a big part of our discussion. Having the experience of a professionalized and institutional space such as Palais de Tokyo on the one side, and Doc!, a squat and art space created in 2016 by a group of artists, activists and craftsmen/women on the other. Without a doubt it was this latter which she felt more stimulated and inspired by. It would be hard to pinpoint whether it was the community aspect of it, the care and mutual respect its internal structured demanded by everyone involved or just the freedom of acting outside predefined institutional frameworks, but certainly listening to her words this feels like one of those deep learning experiences that go beyond what any education or internship can give you.

I feel it’s a kind of research that rids itself from academic and institutional burdens.

What matters most is the time we invest, how we perceive and treat the others involved…

It’s a collective effort of us, the artists, the people that help us produce it and the public.

We have an obligation to care for all of these.

But Paris wasn’t all about Doc!. Facing the structures and limitations of a larger institution like Palais de Tokyo is undoubtedly a great training ground to face the reality of our sector. Confronting the expectations and insecurities of artists in the face of institutional responsibility while understanding internal structures of an organization, even when frustrating, can help you manage projects of all sizes and budgets.

Dialogue four: on how we talked about folklore, a larger research, and our shared love for Istanbul

It’s a bright afternoon in May, the sun has just started to find the strength it will need to turn spring into summer. The streets are still unusually empty on the shores of the Bosporus. The few people I see are all still weary of being out after a long winter marked by the virus and its restrictions on our lives. We meet in a square in Besiktas that in my long time in the city I’ve never seen so empty before. We are both foreigners in this land and yet by chance — there it is again — brought Istanbul into our life creating a bond hardly to be broken.

I had to start knowing the city again, seeing it with fresh new eyes, through the words of the artists I met… learning from Istanbul? Too cliché?

Maybe it’s not that far from reality — we both laugh about it.

When we sit down Eva starts telling me about her research, about her passion for Folklore, at least in part born from that first encounter with the subject in her exhibition in Serifos “Fragments of present”². We meander through memories of folk museums, their display of anonymity behind the makers of the objects on display, through the power of museums to elevate everyday objects to historical heritage and the clash this creates given the daily-use value we still connect many of them with. The discussion slowly shifted to her being here, and how spending time in Istanbul, as part of a curatorial fellowship organized by ARTWORKS and SAHA, has given her the opportunity to rethink the exhibition, “I heard it from the valleys”, which elaborates on this subject exactly. While her research for it started months before even knowing about the residency, this opportunity gave her the chance to include some of the brilliant artists she has gotten to know here. I was particularly curious to hear that she found that when talking about folklore artists in Turkey responded with a much greater attention to immaterial culture, to performative elements of folk culture, to rituals and the imaginary. Which contrasted with her research up to that point, as it was objects and handcrafting itself that occupied the discourses raised by artists she had approached till then. Being here though for Eva was not solely about her artistic research as it was an opportunity to understand the city and its complexities in a more nuanced and profound ways beyond her own family history. It was certainly not the first time I heard the stories of those who had to move away, driven by nationalistic madness and the violence it provoked, the same madness that till this day sadly characterizes many of the discussions between the two countries. And yet in her recounting, the feelings of loss and still palpable grief, mixed with a genuine interest and curiosity about how the heritage of all the minorities still forges large parts of the cultural discourses in Istanbul and Turkey. It’s probably only through these attitudes, on both sides of the Aegean that we will eventually reach a different type of relationship between two neighboring countries that share much but hate to admit it…

Much like her show currently on display at HausN in Athens, which she described as a part of the research rather than an outcome, this conversation feels open ended and ready to continue across the narrow sea separating us these days.

¹ Corentin Canesson, Lucas Erin and Arthur Fouray.

² Co-curated with Danai Giannoglou at the Folklore Museum of Serifos.

Christian Oxenius is a German-Italian independent curator, author and researcher living between Athens and Istanbul. His academic background in sociology and urban studies led him to pursue a PhD at the University of Liverpool on biennials as institutional model, during the course of which he established collaborations with Athens, Liverpool and Istanbul Biennial; during this period, he developed a particular interest in artists’ communities and storytelling. His research into experimental writing on art has resulted in a number of exhibitions and publications of international relevance.

Evita Tsokanta (ET): How would you define your curatorial practice?

Mare Spanoudaki (MS): In the current times of crisis, supported by a growing dissatisfaction for individualistic and materialistic discourses, the conditions that define my approach as a curator, apart from the care for objects or subjects of art, are interdisciplinarity and reflexivity. I am interested in fostering projects that function as sites of aesthetic engagement, social activation and dialogue, while reflecting on the struggles that need to be addressed in the present landscape, without being infantilising and tendentious. A priority in my practice is to challenge and reimagine structures, which are product of dominant narratives, and have sustained long-standing exclusions based on gender, race, geography, ethnicity and sexuality. My intention is to benefit the affected communities, encourage self-determination and mobilise a feeling of togetherness and care for all, within an attempt to rethink the way we relate to one another and the environment we occupy. My practice and ongoing research are manifested in participatory and collaborative exhibitions and events, interactive digital platforms, social media, and written material. Depending on the project, I have explored and examined current and past political, cultural and social conditions working closely with cultural workers, artists, activists, archival and visual material, oral histories and communities.

ET: Could you describe the structure, trajectory and goals of this is not a feminist project?

MS: This is not a feminist project began as an online interactive documentary, that consists of two narratives: a living ‘archive/timeline’ which narrates the histories of the feminist movement in Greece (since 1980) through texts and digitized archival material and a series of short video portraits which demonstrate the reality of women of different backgrounds, who are currently living in Greece. It eventually took the form of a digital platform, built to encourage associations between previous feminist struggles, practices and claims and the current living conditions of women in Greece. The content is accessible to all and maintains a level of interactivity in the stories section where visitors can share their own voices. Given that the Feminist Movement and female experiences as a part of Greece’s social history were digitised and curated for the very first time and that such discussions in the Greek context are undeniably urgent, the platform’s goal is to change the dynamic of people’s perspectives about femininities, to adequately address such issues, to shed light on collective memory, to give historical continuity to important matters and to empower femininities.

We then decided to expand our practices to the public space and inaugurate ‘This is not a feminist project Residency’ believing that the use of visual arts as a tool for dialogue and solidarity should be embedded in the project by increasing opportunities for artists. The 2018/19 Residency drew on the effects of mobility, migration and displacement of women’s lives and on ways that a sense of belonging and self-determination can emerge under such circumstances. By an intimate observation of diverse everyday tasks, rituals and encounters, both mental and physical, the artist-in-residence Jana Koelmel explored the ways with which refugee and migrant women sustain their personalities and well-being, while adapting to a new environment, as individuals and as members of multiple communities. The produced video series ‘The Rhythm of Small Things’ depicts elements of their lives that reflect their personal moments, memories, traditions, dreams and truths and at the same time have become acts of self-care and gestures of emotional balance. The series was presented as an exhibition at the Victoria Square Project’s space in February 2019 and will soon become part of the online platform for more publics to watch.

Towards the end of 2018, after continuous incidents of gender-based violence and discrimination in Greece, it became clear that it was time to focus on the feminist and LGBTQIA+ struggles and discourses that were produced in the present day. We concluded that the best manner to support the diversity and activation of the groups and initiatives that engaged with gender issues in Greece was to visualise their constellation on a digital map. The map currently hosts 15 groups accompanied by relevant written and audiovisual material and welcomes any relevant initiatives. The ultimate goal of this map is to ensure the online presence and visibility of each group, to share their personalities and stories, to demonstrate their actions and claims, to emphasize their value and uniqueness without assimilating and altering their character and to offer them the opportunity to share the present challenges and capabilities of the feminist movement as they have experienced them.

While building the map, we also produced a new series of video portraits, entitled ‘Online Gaze’ by filmmakers Vasia Ntoulia and Nefeli Papaioannou. This series reflected on a specific subject that we felt was necessary to address, since we operate online. In this series four diverse, creative, endearing, and refreshingly sincere femininities share elements of their personality and experiences through the lens of social networking and internet culture. Each one’s online presence and profile carries a distinctive ingenuity and charisma that derives from their daily lives, their trauma, their need for self-identification, acceptance, and love for themselves, as well as the negotiation of their female nature and sexuality. It reveals their longing for a life without hesitation, fear, shame or guilt, their passion for personal expression and their deep desire for liberation from social taboos and stereotypes.

Since the day of its creation, we have agreed that the two-folded digital platform of This is not a feminist project will be the start-line of our activities, but also a basis for experimentation and evolvement. As a result, the platform has become a fluid online environment, a constant work in progress, and a collection of collections, where different research methodologies, practices, and non-linear and diverse content coexist, are juxtaposed and mutually reinforce and complete each other. The purpose is to highlight neglected stories and to underline multiple voices in the present and the relationships that connect them, in order to overthrow deep-rooted stereotypes and dominant narratives in the future. We do not offer a singular, fulfilled and definitive view on the theme, but we invite the visitors into an investigative navigation of data and viewpoints which provoke crossovers.

You can explore the platform of This is not a feminist project and find out more about the people behind it here: notafeministproject.gr

ET: What are the complexities of presenting historiography through social media posts?

MS:Social media platforms host a variety of voices. Although introduced as open and democratic forums, at the same time they encourage specific aesthetics, endorse commodification, superficiality and objectification, and enhance sociopathy, discrimination and narcissism. The unequal distribution of information and communication wealth within it has been spreading manipulation, disinformation and abuse. I use these platforms, in an indirect effort to reverse their utility by systematically sharing miscellaneous, non-linear segments of my research. My activity stands as a counterproposal to normalised media content and canonical forms of production, classification, distribution and presentation of knowledge. I had to adapt the content to the medium’s guidelines (i.e length), I have faced censorship, abusive comments, content reproduction which does not represent the original intentions of the posts, and a dependence on the algorithms that automatically favor what they, consider engaging in an infinite repository of posts. Not to mention that nowadays almost all this activity is gathered by governmental, commercial or covert entities who track and monitor our data. Being active on social media is not only a form of visibility and participation, but also a form of exposure and vulnerability.

ET: What are the different ways the audience is addressed when curating digitally versus curating in a physical space?

MS: The experimentation with various forms of public address can vary according to the nature of the project. An exhibition in a physical space, for instance, is ephemeral and not always accessible, but it can cause a great direct effect on the audience depending on the theme, the immersiveness of the curatorial methodology, the language of the accompanying texts, the atmosphere and specificities of the site itself and the character of the exhibits. There are also myriad opportunities of engagement that can be used to activate deeper interconnections with audiences through discursive, performative, community-building, collaborative and participatory elements.

In a digital context, our experience of time, scale, sensory is quite different. There is free and unrestricted, widespread and intergenerational access to intangible reproductions of content, with the limitation that the visitor has to own the adequate technology. Addressing the audience through digital curating can be determined by the inherent properties of the medium and the level on which the curator is willing to stretch the parameters of a digital environment, to pursue the transformation of the visitors from spectators to participants, with live interaction and connectivity, augmented reality and contextualization of the content with graphics, sound or other media. Again, language is key.

ET: Has the lockdown period and the explosion of digital presentation of cultural texts affected your opinion on the role of digital culture?

MS: It’s definitely positive and comforting to see institutions grasping the opportunity of infrastractural shift to the digital environment, realising online activities, beginning digitisation processes, enabling unprecedented global access to a vast amount of cultural texts, events, exhibitions, films etc and seeking to promote collectivity and openness towards knowledge, art and culture. As long as this does not become the only manner of experiencing culture and we don’t end up living through a screen.

ET: Your academic background includes communications and media. How has that informed your curatorial practice?

MS: My background has inspired my curiosity to research and study exhibitions primarily as communicational tools that make use of artworks to inform, represent, mediate, interpret, transmit ideas and concepts, and produce certain narratives which affect the publics in different ways according to the contexts in which they operate. Secondly, as a historiographical lens through which to explore inquiries around contemporary art history, the interdisciplinary terrain in which artworks are conceived, produced and made public, and the mediated world of historical memory, art, culture and knoweldge. Other aspects of my practice informed by my background are the eagerness to connect and converse, not only with artists, but also different communities and practitioners that I collaborate with, my motivation to experiment and manifest my interests with various media, not only artworks, and my need to always value and consider the importance of the recipients of any of my endeavours.

ET: Curating as a form of knowledge production has been challenged in recent years. How do you see the role of the curator evolving in the future?

MT: I believe that curators, apart from exploring the potential to form a viable perspective for art and culture through their practices, will be preoccupied with the realisation that our future is interconnected and interdependent. Particularly in reference to questions of survival and growth from what was, towards what we are yet to become in regard to mobility, coexistence, multiplicity, communality, nature and shared belongings instead of taking for granted that unity, continuity and consensus already exist. It is urgent that this conception is inhereted by every discipline and person.

ET: What have been the major issues you have faced working as an independent curator in Athens?

MS: The core issue I have been dealing with as an independent curator is how to sustain and cultivate my stamina and enthusiasm, and continue to be active, productive, passionate and creative in a financially unstable environment and a highly competitive field. Independent curatorial practice is precarious, very often unpaid, dependent on relatively minor and scarce funding, and on constant fundraising applications. With a lot of patience and effort I have found ways to survive and tranform the restraints into opportunities so far, however the need to reform the working conditions of independent curators and reverse the general disregard for the occupations involved in contemporary cultural production is crucial for our future. I hope the collective mobilisation we are witnessing by local practitioners at the moment and the public articulation of our situation and requirements will result into fruitful outcomes and the moulding of a substantial and sustainable framework to support the cultural sector.

ET: What are your professional aspirations as an independent curator?

MS: It might seem utopian or even naive, but the ideal situation for me would be to have the capacity to be a co-worker of artists and others practitioners, and work beyond narrow institutional territories, without hierarchical structures and in a non-homogeneous collective environment that would allow us the freedom to create, interpret and experiment in different ways of knowing and unknowing, and ultimately, different ways of being.

Evita Tsokanta is an art historian based in Athens who works as a writer, educator and an independent exhibition-maker. She lectures on curatorial practices and contemporary Greek art for the Columbia University Athens Curatorial Summer Program and Arcadia University College of Global Studies. She has contributed to several exhibition catalogues and journals and completed a Goethe Institute writing residency in Leipzig, Halle 14.