Sanhedrin Conference – Part II

Welcoming Remarks – Eyal Danon
Eyal Danon is the director and chief curator of the Israeli Center for Digital Art (in 2008 was a curator at the Centerr) and co-founder of the Ayam Foundation which is focusing on narratives as tools for social change.

The Spectator of Photography can Undermine the National Foundations of the Modern Museum – Ariella Azoulay
In Azoulay’s presentation, she will draw the contours of the civil spectator and will ask what makes possible a civil point of view upon images. Her presupposition will be that such a point of view refuses to see photographed persons as mere objects of photographs, and will argue that this is not enough. In the context of the occupation – which will be her case study – a civil spectator should transcend not only the rules of the professional space but also those of the national space. Transcending these rules she will find herself in the space of photography where those who have been forced into statelessness and deprived of citizenship, become citizens – citizens of the citizenry of photography. Through photography, the photographed persons demand their right to political speech, gaze and action and invite the spectators to reinstate with them the political space of which they have been dispossessed.
Ariella Azoulay teaches contemporary philosophy and visual culture at the Hermeneutics and Cultural Studies Program at Bar Ilan University, Israel, and is a curator and documentary filmmaker. (lecture is in Hebrew, see Hebrew issue)

The Museum and Alternative History – Galia Bar Or

The lecture will deal with the meaning of the museum, the collection and the exhibition as a space for alternative memory that enables a renewed encounter with past historical intersections from a present day perspective.
Galia Bar Or is the director and curator of the Museum of Art, Ein Harod, Israel. (lecture is in Hebrew, see Hebrew issue)

A Possible Museum; a Look at the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven – Charles Esche 

Esche will provide an introduction to the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, and will look at certain radical moments in the history of the museum. He will explain aspects of his current exhibition and collection policy guided by ideas of radical hospitality and critical memory.
Charles Esche is the director of the Van AbbeMuseum in Eindhoven and co-editor of “Afterall” books and journals.

The Curator as an Interpreter and the Exhibition as the Interpretations’ Resonance – Mordechai Omer
Mordechai Omer was the general director and curator of the Tel-Aviv Museum, a senior professor at the Tel-Aviv University, the initiator and director of the University Gallery. (lecture is in Hebrew, see Hebrew issue)

Closing Panel – Collections as a “Tool Box” for the Designing of Narratives
Charles Esche, Mordechai Omer, Galia Bar Or and Nina Möntmann. Moderator – Galit Eilat

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