VISITING SCHOLAR/CURATOR : DEFNE AYAS
Lecture: Art in the Age of Crisis
Friday March 10, 2017, 4pm @ UHManoa ART Auditorium
How does the creation of art relate to forms of energy and raw material? To oil, gas, or alternative sources such as the sun? Could it even fly on rays of cosmic energy?
Defne Ayas will relate art to the question of crisis, be it aesthetic, geographic, communal and even spiritual. She will also be looking at how artists can be active (co-)creators of possible future vectors of realities, politics, institutions and their representation.
Ayas is a curator and publisher in the field of contemporary visual art and its institutions. She is currently the Director of Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art in Rotterdam, where she oversees an exhibition program devoted to artists, writers, and curators from across the globe. Since 2012, she has commissioned and (co-) curated numerous long-term projects and exhibitions including the recent WERE IT AS IF by Bik van der Pol, Bit Rot by Douglas Coupland and the three-part Art In The Age of… series. Ayas has worked on a number of biennial projects as: curator of the Pavilion of Turkey in the 56th International Art Exhibition, Venice Biennale; co-curator of the 6th Moscow Biennale; co-curator of the 11th Baltic Triennale; city curator for the 9th Shanghai Biennale and curator-at-large at PERFORMA in New York and Spring in Hong Kong. In 2013, Ayas launched WDWReview.org as Witte de With’s esteemed online arts & culture journal, together with Adam Kleinman as its Chief Editor.
This event is made possible by the late Dr. Dai Ho Chun through his estate gift, which established The Dai Ho Chun Endowment for Distinguished Lecturers at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa Colleges of Arts & Sciences. Dr. Chun was a distinguished and visionary educator. This lecture is also sponsored by the College of Arts and Humanities and the College of Languages, Linguistics & Literature.
Contact: Jaimey Hamilton Faris | hamilton.faris@hawaii.edu