Museums, Managers of Consciousness: Institutional Critique and The Politics of Display

From the 1960s forward, many artists have looked closely at the seeming neutrality of museums and cultural institutions, drawing attention to the colonial, economic, political, and social biases elided in the apparently disinterested construction of such displays and collections. Following a consideration of the initial practitioners of this tendency, known as Institutional Critique, in this course we will then investigate feminist, postmodernist, and more contemporary practices in this mode, including debates on—and artistic responses to—cultural restitution. Attention will also be paid to the “institutionalization” that a course such as this creates. Readings will be drawn from artists’ writings and primary documents, art history, philosophy, anthropology, and sociology. Course meetings will be a regular mix of lecture presentations and reading-driven discussion