Curatorial and artistic practice is increasingly enmeshed and embedded in social fabric and public space. Curatorial Studio: Site and Situation enables students to operate creatively, critically and effectively within this context as both initiators and collaborators. The studio provides an opportunity for students to extend and apply curatorial practice and process outside conventional exhibition spaces. It focuses on curation in public sites and the creation of situations both in urban and rural contexts.

Site and Situation looks at the range of curatorial practice in this field, from low-fi projects involving small teams, to larger collaborations and events that may involve professionals from fields such as Engineering, Architecture, Urban Planning, or Public Art agencies.

Students will be introduced to historical debates and contemporary discourse around curatorial practice in public space, including site specificity, performativity, the temporary and the event, social engagement, modes of spectatorship and participation, strategies of intervention, collaboration, and appropriation.

Students will develop speculative, experimental ways of project planning and delivery, suited to these non-traditional scenarios, informed by discourse and practice. Individually, or in groups, students will identify and define a site or set of sites situations through which to curate an artistic and conceptual enquiry that will lead to a project being delivered or projected. They will take into consideration specific aesthetic and socio-political issues at stake and the logistical factors involved in the project, including funding, permissions, and negotiation. With reference to the field, they will critique the limits, challenges and opportunities of their work as well as its visibility, reception and impact.

This studio will equally weight participatory, collaborative, curatorial and textual components encouraging students to engage with the complexity of how curatorial knowledge is produced and activated. This studio will encourage self-reflexivity by integrating forms of self-assessment within external assessment procedures.

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