On 10.11.2018, ODD was a guest in Swimming Pool’s international symposium on curating and art project spaces, which is part of the initiative’s Curatorial School Public Program. This experimental curatorial program, run by Viktoria Draganova, founder and director of Swimming Pool, was successfully launched at the beginning of August with ten participants from Bulgaria, USA, Poland, Argentina and guests from Germany.
The main interest at Swimming Pool lies in the potentials of independent curatorial activity towards creating spaces. Here, physicality is not a pre-condition; when talking of “spaces” they envision mid-and long term initiatives creating their own physical, imaginary and political conditions. Within the frame of the symposium, we explored the agency of project spaces, and how such initiatives can move society. We also reflected on their irregularity (which consists in a low level of institutionalization, shared economy, as well as DIY culture) and how this allows for new types of institutionalization that correspond to how our environment is structured today. We also paid attention to resonance and how to create spaces for joint thinking and imagining.
The symposium engaged both participants and audience in a good discussion on conceptual models, practical challenges and political potentials of project spaces.
Participants:
Alejandro Alonso Díaz
FLUENT, Santander
Cristina Bogdan
ODD, Bucharest
Cathrin Mayer and Maurin Dietrich
BOB’S POGO BAR, Berlin
Vasilis Papageorgiou and Danai Giannoglou
ENTERPRISE PROJECTS, Athens
All photos courtesy of Swimming Pool.