Experimenter Curators Hub

DISCUSSION AND DEBATE OF CURATORIAL PRACTICES ACROSS THE WORLD

Experimenter Curators’ Hub is an annual platform in developing and sustaining discourse on curatorial practice and exhibition-making through critical discussion and debate in Kolkata, India. Structured as a deeply intensive 3-day program, every year the hub invites some of the foremost curators of the world to present their practice with reference to recent exhibitions curated by them. The audience at Experimenter Curators’ Hub plays an active role in this exchange and contributes significantly to the conversations. The final day ends with a moderated panel discussion with all the participating curators, reflecting on the key aspects that emerged over the three days.

Experimenter co-founders and powerhouse couple Prateek and Priyanka Raja share sentiments of their vision: “The Experimenter Curators’ Hub was organised out of a crucial need to critically discuss and debate curatorial practices across the world, to learn, converse and thereby possibly throw open possibilities of understanding what lies behind significant contemporary exhibition-making. The ECH is a unique setting that allows for a certain intimacy, letting curators open up in a way that no other forum allows. The intimateness of the conversations and the possibilities that emerge from some of the most fertile minds in the world of contemporary art is palpable. The energy in the room augments criticism and theory as a starting ground.”

The Australia Council is thrilled to facilitate the participation of Australian Curator of South Asian heritage Tarun Nagesh at the 9th Experimenter Curators’ Hub in November 2019, following the success of the hugely ambitious 9th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (APT9).

The Australia Council will also support the live stream of The Hub, breaking down traditional constraints of location and opening up the debate to people around the world. Online audiences will have the chance to interact with, and question the curators in real time.

Useful Links

APAM


Tarun Nagesh

Tarun Nagesh is Curator of Asian Art at the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) in Brisbane, Australia. He is part of the lead curatorial team of the Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (APT), primarily working with artists in South and South East Asia for the 7th, 8th and 9th editions. Tarun also regularly curates exhibitions for QAGOMA, including recent projects Problem-Wisdom: Thai Art in the 1990s; A Fleeting Bloom: Japanese Art from the Collection; KalpaVriksha: Contemporary Indigenous and Vernacular Art of India (as part of APT8); and Indo Pop: Contemporary Indonesian Art.

Tarun is actively involved in commissions and acquisitions for the QAGOMA collection and also oversees QAGOMA’s historical Asian Art collection and exhibitions. He is a regular contributor to journals and exhibition publications in Australia, is a state representative of the The Asian Arts Society of Australia, a member of the national Asian Art Provenance Research panel, and was a curatorial fellow of the 2018 Dhaka Art Summit. Prior to joining QAGOMA in 2011 Tarun worked in the commercial sector in Melbourne.

“It is a great honour to be invited to the Curator’s Hub, and finally make a trip to Experimenter, Kolkata. It is long overdue. I’m very familiar with this wonderful initiative as many friends have participated and I’ve watched multiple videos in the past (and always wanted to attend!). I’m thrilled to be part of the Curators’ Hub – it really is a great honour.”


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