Independent Curators International

The Storyteller

Curated by Claire Gilman & Margaret Sundell

The Storyteller is an exhibition that focuses on artists who use the story form in contemporary art as a means of comprehending and conveying political and social events. Significantly, unlike their postmodern predecessors, the artists in The Storyteller neither take the idea of documentary truth as an object of their critique nor do they abandon fact for fabulation. Rather, they enable individuals (whether themselves, their subjects or their audience) to construct the story of their unique participation in historical processes, thereby presenting these events in a new and unexpected light.

Responding to the rapid, often violent transformations of the 21st century, contemporary artists have displayed a growing desire to activate art’s documentary capacity, its ability to bear witness to events in the world. All of the works in The Storyteller revolve around situations that are either in the process of unfolding or that continue to impact the lives of the artists or protagonists. However, in each case, these events are re-imagined and thereby re-experienced through the artist’s personal encounter or the character’s narration. For the artists in the exhibition, the story functions neither as a purely imagined narrative nor as a piece of verifiable information. Rather, it is a document of a different sort, one whose focus is less empirical accuracy than the reality of events as they are encountered, experienced and delivered by a thinking, receiving subject and an active listener. The story is at once temporal and personal, public and communal. It persists through the listener’s interpretive process and through each subsequent retelling.

The Storyteller includes an international group of artists working in video, photography, drawing, mixed media and installation: all media that have lent themselves to a documentary approach. Although the featured artists have enjoyed a degree of critical attention, none has yet received serious consideration for the role that storytelling plays in his or her work. In some cases, the artist’s “story” takes the form of a drama based on real events, and in other cases, the stories function less as reconstructions of the past than investigations into the relationship between past and present. A third group appeals to diverse literary genres, and finally, the fourth group of artists initiate a dialogue with active participants in contemporary political situations that their projects then serve to narrate. The exhibition is co-curated by independent curator and writer Claire Gilman and by Margaret Sundell, director of the Creative Capital l Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant Program.

If you are interested in screening a film-only version of this exhibition, please contact ICI for more details and the reduced fee.

For both the film-only version and full exhibition, most of the videos are also available with Spanish subtitles.

Jeremy Deller and Mike Figgis, The Battle of Orgreave, 2002

Artists

Cao Fei, Jeremy Deller & Mike Figgis, Omer Fast, Mounir Fatmi, Ryan Gander, Lamia Joreige, Joachim Koester, Emanuel Licha, Missing Books (Maria Barnas, Maxine Kopsa, Germaine Kruip), Steve Mumford, Adrian Paci, Michael Rakowitz, Liisa Roberts, Hito Steyerl

Additional Images

Lamia Joreige, Objects of War n° 3, 2006

Cao Fei, Whose Utopia, 2006

Ryan Gander, The Boy Who Always Looked Up, 2005

Touring Schedule

AVAILABLE

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September 19, 2010 - March 31, 2012

Independent Curators International

The Storyteller

The Storyteller

Artists

Additional Images

Touring Schedule

AVAILABLE

Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía

Art Gallery of Ontario

Sheila C. Johnson Design Center at Parsons The New School for Design

Salina Art Center

Related Events

The Storyteller: Stories and Panel Discussion

The Storyteller: Film Screenings

The Storyteller: Talk Series

The Storyteller: A Colloquium

The Storyteller Opening Reception

Technical Specs

For Educators