The presence of Tevž Logar, curator, in Accelerator. Mentoring and Production for emerging artist programme is two-fold: on the one hand, he conducted, as a mentor, the laboratory: Curating. The Relation Between Artist and Curator, unveiling consistent insights regarding the artist-curator relationship. And on the other hand, Tevž will be the curator who will handle the group exhibition that will host the new art works which will be produced by the artists in the second part of this year. The exhibition is expected to take place at the beginning of 2023.
We are glad to share Tevž’s views shared with us at the end of the mentorship stage within Accelerator programme.
How was drive level of our 10 emerging artists?
The motivation of the emerging artists selected to take part in Accelerator programme was very clear from the beginning. Even during the selection stage, throughout the interviews, I had noticed that the artists had their own ‘agenda’ and interests within the programme. When we started the mentorship sessions and we met again, we only went more in depth; that was very important for me to understand their profiles and objectives even better. I really appreciate and I welcome the diversity of interests and artistic views, because it gives a particular energy to the group which enables learning and growth for all the people involved.
What recommendations do you have for our artists for their future endeavours?
What matters the most is that they truly believe in their work and they don’t compromise on that. Integrity is a pre-condition and the real foundation. Everything else relating to the system of contemporary art or to career development relies on the ambitions and the path a person embarks upon. Furthermore, for each of us, this also has a different, specific meaning. From what I experienced, I am certain that there are no shortcuts if you want to work long-term.
Which are the top 3 take-away messages the artists should focus on to after your attending your laboratory?
If I look at the focus areas of the artists after Accelerator’s mentorship stage, the take-away messages are different for each artist, so I will approach this topic from a wider angle, not referring to the processes relating to their work and development of their art practice.
My workshop delt with the relationship between the artist and the curator. Therefore, my aim was to bring into the conversation several elements that are of utmost importance for understanding this relationship.
The first one is how this relationship is implemented in the system. It is impossible to define this relationship if you don’t consider its relation to the various types of institutions, theory/principles, media, art market. This is very important because it is only in this way in which each artist in this program will know what elements of the system they should take into consideration and what they should ignore.
The second one is the historical aspect. Not only the relationship developed between artist and curator, which is relatively a new phenomenon, but also the context in which art was defined by and anchored in religion, capital investments, philosophy, conditions of production and other factors. Internalizing these matters is important because you can also reflect your own artistic positioning through existing real-life examples. This is part of the process of becoming an artist.
The third dimension is to follow the artistic path and strive not to compromise often.
Tel us top 3 key learnings from your own experience in the contemporary art field, in your current role?
On the one hand, my learnings are knowledge exchange, dialogue and reflection; not only with artists I’m working, but also with other colleagues, curators, art historians, theoreticians, writers, gallerists. For more than 15 years, I have been building this social network. My profession is “alive”. Exchanging opinions, practices, or solutions and engaging in a dialogue enable me to be in the middle of the most actual trends, and that is very important also for profiling my own curatorial positioning. Another key matter is that, as a professional, you should not be shallow; instead, you should approach things at length and in depth. This can only be achieved by constantly reading books, essays, listening to podcasts, watching films dealing not only with art, but reflecting a broader spectrum of societal matters. Art has always been linked to the society and that is how I approach it, too. The third thing is a little bit more abstract, but also very important. I don’t even know how to describe it, because it doesn’t have to do with the rational side, but is rather linked to emotions and feelings.
Could you share with us a project you worked on and you loved?
For me, the most enjoyable projects are always those in which you work closely with the artist, in a constant dialogue. As a curator, this is the most valuable experience. I will answer this question highlighting a project I did in 2021: When in Doubt, Go To a Museum, with five private collections in the City Museum Ljubljana. The aim of the project was to open the question on collecting contemporary art via the perspective of five collections and their public activities. It was one of the most complex projects I worked on because it involved managing many different relationships that I had to establish as curator. Not only between very different collections, but also among various artistic roles, different hierarchies within collections (collectors, artists, collection curators), relation to the space, relationships between presented works, their specifics. All these cross-functional “horizontal and vertical” collaboration relationships were really challenging, because if they hadn’t been balanced, the exhibition wouldn’t have worked. But, according to the positive feedback received from the collections, the experts and regular public, it obviously worked very well, generating a wide impact even further, either through the exhibition publication or various new exhibition projects triggered by this. The project became a particular “case study” about how to work with various collections and this resulted in a series of new projects involving more in-depth collaborations with collections.
Photo: Exhibition view – When in Doubt, Go to a Museum, credits: Andrej Peunik MGML