Ways of Curating

Curatorial Practices Across Contexts

Terese, aula 1

A guest lecture series bringing together diverse approaches to contemporary curatorial practice.
Curated by Tommaso Speretta as part of the studio-based course STUDIO 1: Curating Arts and Heritage in Intercultural Perspectives, in collaboration with Francesca Filisetti, Master’s degree in curating arts and heritage in intercultural perspectives.


PROGRAMME

18.05.2026
Conversation 8
with Marta Barina, an Artistic Director working across exhibition practice and cultural production between institutional and independent contexts. After a decade in London working with White Cube, David Zwirner, and Oscar Murillo Studio, she founded Mare Karina in Venice in 2024.

Curating Beyond Institutions and Market Constraints
Reflecting on the structural limits that shape curatorial and artistic freedom within institutions and the commercial gallery system, the lecture explores how hybrid roles across curating, project design, and cultural production can create alternative conditions for experimentation.

11.05.2026
Conversation 7 
with Phila Bergmann, a curator and performance scholar. She was co-director of Shedhalle Zürich (2020–2025) and teaches at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts, working across exhibition-making, performance, and research on ephemeral practices.

Bringing Institutions to LIVE: Curating Live Arts and Creating Infrastructures
Reflecting on the ProtoZone as a process-based curatorial model developed at Shedhalle Zürich, the lecture explores how live and transdisciplinary formats engage institutional structures, examining the potentials and constraints of ephemeral art within exhibition-making.

4.5.2026
Conversation 6
with FOS (Thomas Poulsen), a Venice-based Danish artist whose practice spans sculpture, design, and architecture, exploring how these forms interact and transform through social situations.

How Shapeless Makes Shapes
Reflecting on acts of gathering, collecting, and framing, the lecture explores how FOS’s artistic practice parallels curatorial processes, as both spring from the same source through shared acts of selection, material arrangement, and composition.
 

27.04.2026
Conversation 5
with Pia Sophie Ottes, gallery director of Victoria Miro Venice, overseeing exhibitions, residencies, and institutional relationships. She previously worked at Christie’s in London and collaborates with galleries and institutions on exhibition production and cultural projects.

TABLE MANNERS – Mentorship and the Exhibition as a Platform for Community
Using Table Manners—the group exhibition at Barbati Gallery marking five years of the Artist Roundtable—the lecture explores curatorial practice as a tool for community building, where exhibitions function as spaces of dialogue, mentorship, and collective authorship.

20.4.2026
Conversation 4
with Vivian Zavataro, executive and creative director of the Ulrich Museum of Art. 
She is a museologist specializing in contemporary art, community engagement, and audience-centered curatorial practices, and has held positions at institutions including documenta, SFMOMA, and the Getty Foundation.

Curating Institutions: The Role of the Museum Director Today
Reflecting on the evolving role of museums today, the lecture explores how they operate as civic spaces where exhibitions, public engagement, and social responsibility intersect, requiring museum leadership to balance multiple roles: curator, strategist, fundraiser, educator, and community partner.

23.3.2026
Conversation 3
with Julia Marchand, curator and researcher focusing on adolescent aesthetics in visual art. She has served as “rapporteure” for Xie Lei, winner of the 2025 Prix Marcel Duchamp, and was curator at the Fondation Vincent van Gogh Arles (2015–2023).

Does adolescent art exist? 
Exploring whether it is possible to speak of adolescent art and adolescent artists, taking as its starting point her book I am the f***** subject: art&adolescence (Lenz Press, 2026).
 

16.3.2026
Conversation 2
with Ana María Bresciani Arenas, writer and curator at MUNCH – Munchmuseet in Oslo, working across modern and contemporary art. She has held curatorial positions at Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, and KORO (Public Art Norway), and chairs the board of BEK (Bergen Centre for Electronic Arts) since 2024.

Cacao Promises: Edvard Munch and the Freia Frieze 
Examining Edvard Munch’s Freia Frieze (1923) in relation to the Freia Chocolate Factory and its female workers after World War I, the lecture explores how art intersects with labour, gender, and class, revealing the promises and exclusions of early twentieth-century industrial society.
 

9.3.2026
Conversation 1
with Irene Calderoni, artistic director of Scuola Piccola Zattere, a center dedicated to research, production, and education in contemporary arts in Venice.

Curating in/for/through the Institution
Exploring the relationship and mutual influence between curatorial practice and institutional structures, from long-term artistic processes to exhibitions, artist residencies, performances, and site-specific interventions.