e-flux Field Notes // Documenta15
INLAND, Cheese Pavilion. Installation view, Museum of Natural History Ottoneum, Kassel, June 28, 2022. Photo: Nicolas Wefers.
Whether as praise or complaint, you’ve probably heard of Indonesian art collective ruangrupa’s sprawling, radically decentered approach to curating Documenta 15. They have pushed back on the most basic tenets of art-industry professionalism including artist lists, commitment to announced public programming, installations being completed before the opening, and apparently knowing what works were going to be included. In a way, that was the point. Their collective-of-collectives lumbung framework dispensed with hierarchical organizational structures as an ideological stance. But curating by delegated committee, or what artist and curator Mohammad Salemy has likened to a Decentralized Autonomous Organization, [1] created a Jesus-take-the-wheel rookie mistake of participatory action, proving that, as on the internet, Godwin’s law applies to the world’s foremost exhibitions of contemporary art. [2] With estimates of around 1,500 artists credited as participating in Documenta 15, the scale and the distribution of responsibility and accountability made it all but guaranteed an offensive work would slip through the cracks. For many, the resulting central display of a work bearing anti-Semitic imagery ultimately made the strongest case for what ruangrupa’s lumbung was meant to be an alternative to—centralized curatorial authority.
Lead image credit: INLAND, Crafts and Workshop materials. Installation view, Museum of Natural History Ottoneum, Kassel, June 28, 2022. Photo: Nicolas Wefers.
