The idea of artists-curators at the 33rd Bienal de São Paulo: artists in historical negotiation with cultural institutions

Abstract

In this paper we lay the debate between artist and curator in the framework of Art history: firstly based on the events stemming from the proposal for the creation of a Museum of Live Artists in France, and then on how, in the middle of the XX century, with the origin of the profession of the exhibition curator, the artists start to question the role of the curator as a mediator between artists and the public. With this historical presentation on the presence of this debate in the art worlds, we intend to situate the perspective presented in the curatorship of the 33rd Bienal de São Paulo along the relationship between artists and the cultural institutions, especially the art museums. As this paper is part of a broader research on theories and methodologies of exhibition curatorship, we develop further our discussion on the definitions that were found in the national and international press on the model proposed by Gabriel Pérez-Barreiro. This analysis was done based on this documentary corpus. Not only have we approached the textual content published by the organization of 33ª Bienal de São Paulo, but also articles from cultural journalism sources and art critics that went through the national and international medias. To  develop this analysis, we have as reference Howard Becker, Jérôme Glicenstein, J. Pedro Lorente, among others.