The Future is Curatorial! Reconceptualising Curation Through Material Culture

Objects, though the material stuff of curating, occupy a peripheral role in curatorial theory and practice. Art and museum curating both promote relational and ideological positions that centre on certain people, excluding less prominent participants and objects alike. Although all these groups have been examined at length for their discursive qualities, their active processes are still mostly unclear. Developments in material culture theory suggest the need for re-evaluation of the relationship between objects, curators, and audiences, based on these processes. This dissertation is an attempt to construct a concept of curating that begins with objects, the circumstances in which they take part, and the effects they have on the people around them. This investigation into the operations of people and things approaches the subject with an interdisciplinary eye, drawing upon art history, media studies, material culture studies, sociology, anthropology, and other fields. They are linked by a strongly qualitative methodology, which incorporates the researcher's own subjective experiences with a conceptual framework derived from Deleuze and Guattari and Bruno Latour. The use of a rhizomatic perspective based on movement, emergence, and opportunity opens up a series of alternative methodological and analytical approaches. With these tools, four creative works are examined and discussed as singular objects and guides to further generalisation. The research suggests a degree of complexity and potential within objects that is rarely considered. Peoples' interactions with objects mean they share in that potential, opening up the static and structured roles previously addressed. A series of curatorial practices are derived from these findings, expanding the definition of 'curator' by allowing for the exercise of distinct curatorial functions beyond the institution. This dissertation serves as a starting point for a democratic reconceptualisation of curating, based on processes rather than end points, involving the public as curatorial agents.