Maria Hlavajova

Simon Sheikh

What has become of the so-called West after the Cold War? Why hasn't the West simply become "former," as has its supposed counterpart, the "former East"? In this book, artists, thinkers, and activists explore the repercussions of the political, cultural, and economic events of 1989 on both art and the contemporary. The culmination of an eight-year curatorial research experiment, Former West imagines a world beyond our immediate condition. The writings, visual essays, and conversations in Former West -- more than seventy diverse contributions with global scope -- unfold a tangled cartography far more complex than the simplistic dichotomy of East vs. West. In fact, the Cold War was a contest not between two ideological blocs but between two variants of Western modernity. It is this conceptual "Westcentrism" that a "formering" of the West seeks to undo. The contributions revisit contemporary debates through the lens of a "former West." They rethink conceptions of time and space dominating the legacy of the 1989--1990 revolutions in the former East, and critique historical periodization of the contemporary. The contributors map the political economy and social relations of the contemporary, consider the implications of algorithmic cultures and the posthuman condition, and discuss notions of solidarity -- the difficulty in constructing a new "we" despite migration, the refugee crisis, and the global class recomposition. Can art institute the contemporary it envisions, and live as if it were possible? Contributors include Nancy Adajania, Edit Andr�s, Athena Athanasiou, Zygmunt Bauman, Dave Beech, Brett Bloom, Rosi Braidotti, Boris Buden, Susan Buck-Morss, Campus in Camps, Dipesh Chakrabarty, Chto Delat?/What is to be done?, Jodi Dean, Boaventura de Sousa Santos, Angela Dimitrakaki, Dilar Dirik, Marlene Dumas, Keller Easterling, Charles Esche, Okwui Enwezor, Silvia Federici, Mark Fisher, Federica Giardini and Anna Simone, Boris Groys, Gulf Labor Coalition, Stefano Harney, Graham Harwood, Sharon Hayes, Brian Holmes, Tung-Hui Hu, Wendy Hui Kyong Chun, Sami Khatib, Delaine Le Bas, Boaz Levin and Vera Tollmann, Lucy Lopez, Isabell Lorey, Sven Lütticken, Ewa Majewska, Suhail Malik, Artemy Magun, Teresa Margolles, Achille Mbembe, Laura McLean, Cuauht�moc Medina, Sandro Mezzadra, Walter D. Mignolo, Aernout Mik, Angela Mitropoulos, Rastko Močnik, N�stio Mosquito, Rabih Mrou�, Pedro Neves Marques, Peter Osborne, Matteo Pasquinelli, Andrea Phillips, Nina Power, Vijay Prashad, Gerald Raunig, Irit Rogoff, Naoki Sakai, Rasha Salti, Francesco Salvini, Georg Sch�llhammer, Christoph Schlingensief, Susan Schuppli, Andreas Siekmann, Jonas Staal, Hito Steyerl, Mladen Stilinović, Paulo Tavares, Trịnh Thị Minh H�, Mona Vătămanu, Marina Vishmidt, Marion von Osten, McKenzie Wark, Eyal Weizman

Art and the Contemporary After 1989

Former West

Katya Sander

In recent years, Nordic art has become increasingly influential on the international art scene. We Are All Normal is an anthology of artists writings from the Nordic and Baltic region, providing an essential overview of this exciting and productive period in contemporary art. By gathering together writings by the artists themselves. We Are All Normal looks at art from an artistic rather than art historical point of view, with texts that are poetic, playful, critical and celebratory. Following a number of thematics or lines of enquiry, the texts consider the much maligned Nordic tradition as well as the hyped 'Nordic Miracle' of the 1990s. Also examined are pop and politics, the predicament of the welfare state model, constructions of self, questions of gender and institutional critique, and 'northern style'.

A Collection of Contemporary Nordic Artists Writings

We are All Normal (and We Want Our Freedom)

Kaja Silverman

Philippe Pirotte

Knut Åsdam

Bergen kunsthall

In a companion book to the challenging exhibition at Bergen Kunsthalle, viewersexperience the latest work of Norwegian artist Knut Asdam, one of Europe'scentral contemporary practitioners of film, video art and installation. Thispublication brings together a collection of new commissioned texts on the projectsin the exhibition: Asdam's new films, Abyss and Tripoli (both 2010), and a newinstallation work based on the artist's own archive of found photo material.Exploring once again themes of transformation and relocation, borders andboundaries, inside and outside, Asdam confronts issues like the migrationof people between land areas, or physical movement and the bodilyexperience of architecture in urban surroundings.

The Long Gaze the Short Gaze

Paul O'Neill

Mick Wilson

Lucy Steeds

What it means to be global—or to be local—in the context of artistic, curatorial, and theoretical knowledge and practice. In this volume, an international, interdisciplinary group of writers discuss what it means to be global—or to be local—in the context of artistic, curatorial and theoretical knowledge and practice. Continuing the discussion begun in The Curatorial Conundrum (2016) and How Institutions Think (2017), Curating After the Global considers curating and questions of locality, geopolitical change, the reassertion of nation-states, and the violent diminishing of citizen and denizen rights across the globe. It has become commonplace to talk of a globalized art world and even to speak of contemporary art as a driver of globalization. This universalization of what art is or can be is often presumed to be at the cost of local traditions and any sense of locality and embeddedness. But need this be the case? The contributors to Curating After the Global explore, among other things, specific curatorial projects that may offer roadmaps for the globalized present; new institutional approaches; and ways of thinking, vocabularies, and strategies for moving forward. Contributors include Lotte Arndt, Marwa Arsanios, Athena Athanasiou and Simon Sheikh, María Berríos and Jakob Jakobsen, Qalandar Bux Memon, Ntone Edjabe and David Morris, Liam Gillick, Alison Greene, Yaiza María Hernández Velázquez, Prem Krishnamurthy and Emily Smith, Nkule Mabaso, Morad Montazami, Paul-Emmanuel Odin, Vijay Prashad, Kristin Ross, Grace Samboh, Sumesh Sharma, Joshua Simon, Hajnalka Somogyi, Lucy Steeds, Françoise Vergès Copublished with the Center for Curatorial Studies Bard College/Luma Foundation

Roadmaps for the Present

Curating After the Global

Simon Sheikh

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