A Different Point of View Event

In the framework of Verein K’s residency for four international art critics Visiting Critics Vienna 2018 we cordially invite you to the panel discussion on the role of art criticism.

How does art in Vienna look from the perspective of international art critics? How do they see the role of criticism today? Are there national differences in writing about art? In the final discussion of Verein K’s residency program Visiting Critics Vienna, we will address these and many other questions.

During an intense one week program, the participants discover institutions and galleries and have personal encounters with artists, theorists, curators and other representatives of the Viennese art scene. Eventually they write about an exhibition, event or artist related to the contemporary art scene in Austrian in international or Austrian art magazines - but before that the four guests talk at the KUNST HAUS WIEN about their week in Vienna and their conception of criticism.

Participants:
Aleksei Borisionok (Belarus) is an art critic, independent curator and researcher who studied in Vilnius and Stockholm lives and now works and lives in Minsk. He co-founded Kalektar and Work Hard, Play Hard. Aleksei’s writes for Partisan, Moscow Art Magazine, Artaktivist, Hjärnstorm, Prastory and others.

Sean O’Toole (South Africa) is an author, critic, journalist and editor based in Cape Town. He writes for Artforum, Frieze, Harvard Design Review, Mail & Guardian and Sunday Times (SA) and won numerous awards for his work. Together with painter Zander Blom, he founded the art, performance and music project The Bad Reviews.

Josie Thaddeus-Johns (UK) is a writer and editor from London, based in Berlin since 2012. She studied Classics at the University of Oxford. Josie writes about culture – mostly art, though she also covers tech, music, film. She worked as Online and Associate Editor of Sleek from 2014-5. Currently she is a freelance writer and editor with bylines at the Guardian, Frieze, Artforum, The Economist, The White Review, and many more.

Daniel Udy (UK/Canada) is a Toronto-based writer who studied in Oxford and London’s King’s College. He writes for ArtReview, The Times Literary Supplement, Jump Cut: A Review of Contemporary Media and TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly. His first book project is about performance, mediation, and the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

Moderator:
Klaus Speidel (Germany/Austria), philosopher, art critic, curator and a researcher specializing in art and picture theory at Vienna University, and co-founder of Verein K. He writes for Spike, artpress and Art Newspaper.