The Politics of the Unexpected: Transformative Practices in a Landscape of Crisis

Samenvatting

In this article I explore four instances that challenged and reshaped the cultural imaginary, rethinking the place and situatedness of artistic practice across different contexts and historical moments: a theatre (Embros, 2011), a conference (Institutions, Politics, Performance, 2015), a biennial (DIY Performance Biennial, 2016), and a gallery/cultural space (Hills and Fields, 2022). Ranging from grassroots initiatives to public programmes that received institutional support, these practices were initiated by an evolving collective body that—as this discussion will show—blurred the boundaries between content and context, repeatedly giving rise to unexpected manifestations. I will seek to unpack “instituting” as a critical practice in space-making, which often emerges through what I have elsewhere called “militant curating”—a way of situating critical discourse that attempts both to experiment within and to intervene in the existing landscape.