Vasif Kortun (Ayvalık, Turkey) is a well-known curator, former director of SALT art center, he has curated and directed the third Istanbul biennaal, he was the founding director of the Museum of the Centre of Curatorial Studies at Bard College from 1994-1997. Furthermore, he curated the Turkish pavilions for the 1994 and 1998 iterations of the São Paolo Bienal, as well as the 2007 Venice Biennale.
From the end of 1990s to early 2000s, catchy labels like the Nordic or Balkan miracles signalled high expectations of integration in a new art context and even its markets. Modest initiatives gave way in time to gargantuan projects like the Abu Dhabi Guggenheim and it became obvious that this was not normalization. In his talk Kortun hopes to address what changed in the last decade with a focus on Turkey.
The series is supported by: Estonian Cultural Endowment, Baltic-American Freedom Foundation, Estonian Academy of Science
Recorded by Tõnis Jürgens at the Academy of Sciences.