Civic Actions: Artists’ Practices Beyond the Museum
The Museum of Contemporary Art’s (MCA’s) conference began with questions: ‘Does a socially engaged practice inhibit artistic excellence?’ ‘What is the curatorial role in front-end community consultation?’ ‘What is the role of artists in urban and social planning processes?’ The Civic Actions conference set out to explore the intersections of ‘art, urban planning, architecture, culture and the future of Sydney’.
The bustle on Sydney’s Circular Quay spilled into the MCA’s theatre where Creative Time’s (New York) chief curator Nato Thompson launched Civic Actions with his lecture ‘Culture is the Language of the Commons’, which included many ideas taken from his new book, Seeing Power: Art and Activism in the 21st Century. Thompson brought an American perspective to this contemporary arts discourse. He spoke candidly about race and power, and how Creative Time addresses these issues with the artists they support. A few nodding heads from the audience indicated endorsement of his ideas, but it appeared to me that the Australian-centric audience did not engage as readily as other audiences I have observed. Do all political art discourses translate across borders? Socially-engaged art practices are highly geo-political in their origins, attempting to engage local issues, affected as much by institutional and policy histories as social movements. Lack of response to Thompson’s charismatic delivery revealed cultural differences across the Pacific, even though many of the attendees and presenters work within the racially-charged spaces of community engagement. Was he and the MCA importing these ideas with the hope that Australians would embrace their own contentious colonial histories and current policies related to race, indigeneity and migration?
Over the following two days, we heard several keynotes and listened to panels of artists, urban