- Sarah Demeuse
The beginning: 18 installation shots, a press release, a gallery leaflet. These remainders of Making History, a 1999 CCS Bard thesis exhibition, are the backbone of Andrea van der Straeten’s unusual inquiry into a past show’s propositions. Her 2010 tweaked reinterpretation emerges out of conversations and collaborative research with the curator, who was eager to know and use what came before. Not Again takes place in the same gallery space as Making History, but it appears as an echo and functions as a cabinet of interpretations.
Visitors meander between past and present exhibitions, immersing themselves in the aural and textual juxtaposition. Not Again suggests repetition, but refuses exact reproduction. Instead, it heightens ephemerality and explores the differences in subjective memory, interpretation, and observation.
Van der Straeten’s encounter with the archived documents and her ensuing readings brought about new works on paper—site-specific wall drawings—and sculptural interventions. Not Again riffs off the spatial distribution in the original exhibition. Van der Straeten also associates the show’s historical references, the Kent State shootings and the social upheavals of the late 1960s, with literary texts from other historical periods. As a whole, her work interrupts linear patterns of history making and focuses on recurring idioms in political rhetoric.
Working from Vienna, van der Straeten’s distance from the original exhibition is both temporal and spatial. Her work at Bard continues her ongoing research into informal and uncertain forms of communication. In Not Again, she combines her long-standing interest in literature and communication science into a temporary gallery installation.
Panel Discussion:
Saturday, April 24, 1 – 3 p.m.
CCS Bard Galleries
“Unpacking the Exhibition Archive”
Public in-gallery panel with Ann Butler (director of library and archives, CCS Bard), Kari Conte (independent curator), and Prem Krishnamurthy (Project Projects).
Not Again is curated by Sarah Demeuse as part of the requirements for the master of arts degree in curatorial studies.
Student-curated projects at CCS Bard are made possible with support from the Rebecca and Martin Eisenberg Student Exhibition Fund; the Mitzi and Warren Eisenberg Family Foundation; the Audrey and Sydney Irmas Charitable Foundation; the Board of Governors of the Center for Curatorial Studies, and by the Center’s Patrons, Supporters, and Friends. Special thanks to the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation. Student-curated projects at CCS Bard are made possible with support from the Rebecca and Martin Eisenberg. Additional support is provided by the Monique Beudert Award Fund.
