2020 Roundup of the Arts
Throughout 2020, I’ve been writing bi-monthly articles for lowercase outlining some of the wonderful artistic projects, collaborations, exhibitions and endeavours over this crazy year. If anything, the art world, due to the resilience and determination of its makers, has shown itself to be a robust and adaptable– a claim few other industries can make.
As new year opens up, I’d like to take this opportunity to remember some of the projects that have inspired me in 2020. This is the lowercase roundup, in no specific order.
1. Zoya Cherkassky, Lost Time. Curated by Alison M. Gingeras.
Organized by star curator and prolific writer Alison M. Gingeras, Lost Time, presents the recent works of Zoya Cherkassky. An online exhibition, the showcase juxtaposed high-tech technology in its presentation with Cherkassky’s arcane paintings of old-world Jews and Russians. First on this list as it exemplifies a high-quality digital showcase, and through its conflation of old subjects with new media, showcases the possibilities of new media and traditional artmaking.
http://www.fortgansevoort.com/
2. Black Lives Matter Monuments
After the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, painted monuments, alleyways and buildings became a ubiquitous method of protest against police cruelty and for the BLM movement. Alongside the sometimes-violent clashes at sites of protest, murals and public artworks allowed for peaceful, socially-distanced and powerful messages to be spread globally.
3. Nicholas Galanin, Shadow on the Land, and excavation and bush burial
The repercussions from the surging BLM movement were global, reaching Australia, where indigenous rights issues are far from solved. Nicholas Galanin, an indigenous Australian artist, created one of the most critical and cunning public artworks for the 2020 Sydney biennale as protests in the states were at their peak. The work takes the form of a buried outline of Captain Cook’s sculpture in Sydney, the ‘discoverer’ of Australia, and was revealed 250 years after Cook first claimed Australia for the United Kingdom.
4. Restitution of cultural objects
Earlier in the year I wrote an article for lowercase outlining my personal gripes with the art world, in which I discussed the significant and problematic issue of cultural restitution and repatriation (click here). For those not familiar, the refusal by colonial countries to return the cultural items they stole from former colonies. On December 15, a landmark French bill was passed and will oversee the restitution of 27 objects to Benin and Senegal. A drop on the ocean when you take into account the hundreds of thousands of owed artefacts, however a necessary starting legislation to outline further paths of restitution.
5. Desert X AIUlA 2020
In January, before social distancing was at the forefront of event management, curators Raneem Farsi, Aya Alireza and Neville Wakefield launched Desert X AIUla in the Northern Desert of Saudi Arabia. The project took site specific projects as a possibility for the thematic exploration of astronomy, capitalism water scarcity and more, in a unique and barren landscape not usually seen in the art world.
6. COVID-19 Murals
At a time where galleries were forced to close, public art took on heightened levels of importance. These works are outside, able to be viewed in safe and socially distanced ways and can be shared around the globe. They sated my desire for art when a lockdown was imposed on my city, and as many took on a humorous approach, brightened up my day.
7. Ivana Franke, Resonance of the Unforseen
On view outside the Yokohama Museum of Art, presented for the Yokohama Triennial, 2020, sits Ivana Franke’s Resonance of the Unforseen. Completely covering the building in a veil which comes alive in the slightest of breezes, this compelling work is half Christo and Jeanne-Claude and half commentary on COVID-19 closures.
8. Donald Judd, MOMA.
Lowercase usually steers clear of blockbuster exhibitions, however Donald Judd’s 2020 retrospective exhibition, Judd, is a deserved exception. At the beginning of 2020 I believed that minimalism wouldn’t have had much to contribute to the artist community, however this exhibition left a deep impression on me. The works are sensuous, incanting and endearing, taking on a new and subdued form within the context of 2020.
9. Google Arts
Google Arts and Culture, the online platform dedicated to providing access to the collections of the world’s leading galleries and museums, partnered with over 500 galleries early in 2020 to enable the virtual tours of many more spaces. Their simple VR-based technology is as pertinent now as it has ever been and has enabled the globe access to significant knowledge.
10. Art in the Age of Coronavirus
Curated by Christian Viveros-Fauné and organised by USF Contemporary Art Museum, Life During Wartime (LDW) is a virtual exhibition that responded to the world health crisis. Many virtual exhibitions were created however LDW aptly and effectively placed a number of international comtemporary artists into the one virtual space, while providing an effective forum for artists to respond to the various problems and challenges of the year.
Emerson Radisich is a curator, writer and educator currently based in Melbourne, Australia.