A panel discussion organised by the MA in Visual Arts Practices (MAVIS, IADT) on 
Friday February 11, 2011, 2-5pm 
at The LAB, Foley St., Dublin 1 (Room 5, 4th Floor) 
 
In collaboration with The LAB, Trinity College Dublin and the National Library of Ireland, MAVIS will host a panel discussion exploring the relationship between Curating and the University, featuring invited curators, researchers and educators. The issues to be explored include the history and future of the university gallery as an institution in Ireland and elsewhere; the relationship between collections and contemporary curatorial practice in the visual arts and other fields; the role of teaching collections in curatorial studies in the US and elsewhere; issues of access and resourcing in relation to university collections and archives; the role of curators as researchers and educators, and in making collections publicly accessible. The discussion will be chaired by Maeve Connolly, writer and lecturer on MAVIS. Those wishing to book a place at this free event should email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it with Curating the University in the subject line.

Participants:
Ana Paula Cohen, independent curator, editor and writer.
Valerie Connor writes freelance on art, culture and policy & works on the BA Photography DIT and MAVIS, IADT.
Catherine Morris, Cultural Coordinator, Trinity College Dublin & National Library of Ireland.
Matt Packer, Curator of Exhibitions & Projects, Lewis Glucksman Gallery, University College Cork.
Amanda Ralph, Artist, student, MAVIS/IADT lecturer.

Biographies:
Ana Paula Cohen is an independent curator, editor and writer. She most recently worked as the Curator-in-residence at the Center for Curatorial Studies – Bard College, NY (2009/2010), where she organized the exhibition: “Living Under the Same Roof: The Marieluise Hessel Collection and the Center for Curatorial Studies”. Cohen was the Co-curator for the 28th Bienal de São Paulo, “In living contact”, and co-editor of all related publications. In 2007, she co-curated the project Encuentro Internacional de Medellín 07 – in which she created, in collaboration with other artists and curators, a new center for contemporary art: La Casa del Encuentro. Within the framework of the Encuentro, Cohen organized an exhibition on Cildo Meireles’ work at the Museo de Antioquia. She has been a contributor to several art magazines such as Frieze, Art Nexus, and Exit Express, and has written for many art publications, concerning the work of artists such as Goldin & Senneby, Javier Penãfiel, Rosangela Rennó, Oscar Muñoz, and Cildo Meireles. Cohen has organized several conferences and series of talks; the most recent includes “History as a flexible matter: artistic practices and new systems of reading” (Nov 2008), and “About particularities: how to collect and display artistic practices in contemporary art museums?” (Feb 2010).

Maeve Connolly is a Lecturer in the School of Creative Arts at Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design & Technology in Dublin, where she leads the Visual Cultural Research module on the MA in Visual Arts Practices (MAVIS). She regularly contributes reviews to Artforum and her writing on art and film has appeared in journals such as Afterimage, Art Monthly, Frieze, MAP, Screen, Third Text and Variant. Her book The Place of Artists’ Cinema: Space, Site and Screen (Bristol: Intellect,  2009), examines the social, economic and political conditions shaping the production and exhibition of artists’ film and video since the mid 1990s. She has curated screening programmes such as ‘Citing Cinema in Artists’ Films’ (GFT, Glasgow, 2010, with Sarah Neely and Sarah Smith), ‘Event-Site: The Place of Artists’ Cinema’ (Picture This, Bristol, 2010), ‘Animation Art Wandering’ (Darklight Film Festival, Dublin 2006). She co-curated the exhibition ‘The Captain’s Road’ with Valerie Connor and Orla Ryan (various venues, Dublin, 2002) and in 2000 she co-edited, with Orla Ryan, a collection of texts and artists’ projects, entitled The Glass Eye: Artists and Television (Dublin: Project Press).

Valerie Connor has worked in the visual arts as an artist, writer, curator and policy adviser. With the art group Blue Funk, she exhibited collaborative projects in New York, Arnhem, Perth, Brisbane and Dublin in the early 1990s. On completing an MPhil in Women’s Studies at TCD, Valerie joined Project Arts Centre in 1998 as the Visual Arts Director, leaving in 2001 to work freelance and co-curate local authority and independent art projects in Dublin and Carlow. In 2002, she was appointed as Commissioner for Ireland’s participation at the Venice and São Paulo Biennials, 2003 and 2004. Valerie is a former board member of the Irish Museum of Modern Art and was the Arts Council’s Visual Arts Adviser from 2006 to 2010. A contributor to the forthcoming Royal Irish Academy and Yale University Press project on the art and architecture of Ireland, her previous writing has appeared in the Visual Artists’ News Sheet, Third Text, Circa and Contemporary magazine as well as artists’ monographs and exhibition catalogues. She teaches photography and curatorial modules at DIT and the MA in Visual Art Practices IADT.

Catherine Morris is the Cultural Coordinator at Trinity College Dublin and the National Library of Ireland. Her work includes forging links between the University and its cultural partners, in particular she is working closely with the National Library to create a series of collaborative initiatives and educational partnerships. This joint appointment is the first of its kind in Ireland and is part of Trinity’s  pioneering initiative in the Creative Arts, Technologies and Culture (CATC). Her contribution to this seminar forms part of a series of CATC and NLI events. Catherine is the curator of the exhibition 'Alice Milligan and the Irish Cultural Revival' exhibition showing at the National Library of Ireland until 8 March. This show uses the multidisciplinary visual and manuscript archives of the National Library to tell the extraordinary story of one of Ireland's most prolific cultural and political activists. Her book of the same title will be published later this year. She has written many articles for Irish newspapers and journals including most recently her essay about Republican Irish Tableaux in the "Field Day Review", (December 2010) edited by Seamus Deane. She has taught literature in several universities, worked as a researcher on the Yeats Letters in Oxford university and is co-editor of the James Connolly Special Issue of Interventions, an international postcolonial journal. For further information about the role of the cultural coordinator and the CATC events (of which this seminar is a part) please see http://www.tcd.ie/catc/flagship-areas/cultural-heritage.php and http://www.tcd.ie/Communications/news/pressreleases/pressRelease.php?headerID=1583&pressReleaseArchive=2011. Further information about the Alice Milligan exhibition and a free booklet written by Catherine Morris can be found at (http://www.nli.ie/).

Matt Packer is Curator of Exhibitions & Projects at Lewis Glucksman Gallery, University College Cork, where he has curated exhibitions including 'School Days: the look of learning' (2010-11), 'Grin & Bear It: cruel humour in art & life' (2009), 'Getting Even: oppositions & dialogues in contemporary art' (2008), and 'Wishful Thinking' (2011), a touring programme of artists' film featuring artists Deborah Stratman and Joao Gusmao & Pedro Paiva among others.  Independent curatorial projects include 'When Flanders Failed' (2011), co-curated with Stephen Brandes, at the Royal Hibernian Academy, Dublin, and 'Ice Trade' (2007), co-curated with Kim Dhillon, at Chelsea Space, Chelsea College of Art & Design, London. He studied on the Curatorial programme at Goldsmiths College, London, and is a current member of IKT, the international association of curators of contemporary art.

Amanda Ralph is an artist whose practice is based on ideas generated though research of material in the public realm. Projects are currently being developed through research at the Centre for the Study of Irish Art at the National Gallery of Ireland and through publically available material generated by the Hopper bequest to the Whitney Museum of American Art. Amanda has previously developed ideas working at the Centre for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona, the Coroner's Court Dublin, the Economic and Social Research Institute, the Multiple Sclerosis Care Centre, and the Graduate School of Creative Arts, Dublin. Experience of being both a student and lecturer ranges across Bachelors and Masters programmes at Trinity College Dublin, the University of Arizona Tucson, the Royal Academy for Art and Design, s'Hertogenbosch and the National College of Art and Design Dublin. Since 2000 Amanda has been a full-time Lecturer in the School of Creative Arts at Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology and for the previous four years has been Programme Director of the MA in Visual Arts Practices. Amanda has been the recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship, a one-year artist residency at the International Studio Programme at PS1 MoMA, three-year artist residency at the Fire Station Artist's Studios and has been awarded a number of Arts Council of Ireland bursaries. Amanda has served on the board of the National Sculpture Factory Cork, the board of The Sculptor's Society of Ireland and is currently a member of the International Association of Art Critics, Ireland.