Inclusionary Effects. Lecture by Bassam El Baroni as part of the exhibition Landscapes of Belonging
6 April, 7 pm
In English
Free admission

The point of departure for this lecture is the ideas of the curator and theorist Stéphanie Bertrand on the question of how curatorial practice contributes to inclusion and how cultural inclusion impacts social inclusion. According to Bertrand, access to representation for marginalised cultures and their visibility in art (cultural inclusion) is only associated with access to wealth, resources, and participation (social inclusion) to a limited extent. How can artists, curators, museums, and exhibitions address this inequity and rethink the impact that their inclusive practices have?

Bassam El Baroni is Assistant Professor in Curating at the School of Arts, Design and Architecture, Aalto University, Finland. Formerly, he has lectured at the Dutch Art Institute, ArtEZ University of the Arts, Arnhem and was artistic director of the now folded non-profit art space ACAF - Alexandria Contemporary Arts Forum in Alexandria, Egypt (2005–2012). His current research engages with financialization in relation to artistic practices, artists’ engagement with infrastructural futures and histories, and new forms of artist-led activism.
Recent curatorial projects include: Infrahauntologies at the Edith-Russ-Haus for Media Art, Oldenburg, Germany, and La Box, ENSA Bourges, France (2021, 2022). Previous curatorial projects include: Manifesta 8, Murcia, Spain, 2010 (co-curator); the Lofoten International Art Festival, Norway, 2013 (co-curator with Anne Szefer Karlsen and Eva González-Sancho); Agitationism, the 36th Eva International–Ireland’s Biennial, Limerick, 2014; What Hope Looks like after Hope (On Constructive Alienation) at HOME WORKS 7, Beirut, 2015.
He is the author of various essays on artists, art and curating, and editor of Between the Material and the Possible: Infrastructural Re-examination and Speculation in Art (Sternberg Press, forthcoming, February 2021) and co-editor, together with Ida Soulard and Abinadi Meza, ofManual for a Future Desert (Mousse Publishing, 2021). He holds a PhD in Curatorial Knowledge, Department of Visual Cultures, Goldsmiths, University of London.