Curator at work (2024)

Curator at Work examines the performative nature of fundraising as an integral part of a curator’s role, particularly within the context of live art. Unlike object-based curation, where sales of tangible artworks can help offset exhibition costs, live art relies on alternative funding streams. These include state subsidies, corporate sponsorships, partnerships, brand alignments and an endless cycle of applications and proposals – all in pursuit of financial support.

Set against this backdrop, the performance juxtaposes the melancholic figure of a mourning gnome with the bell-ringing Salvation Army, adopting a playful yet incisive tone. Staged as an intervention during the 2024 National Arts Festival at its headquarters, the work sought to spotlight these financial complexities. As South Africa’s largest arts festival, the event attracts significant attention from government, corporate, parastatal and private entities with the capacity to support national arts and culture. 

By transforming the act of fundraising into a live performance, Curator at Work adopts a meta-critical approach, blurring the boundaries between the act of curation and the curated medium itself. The performance reflects on and critiques the economic structures underpinning performance art, turning the pursuit of financial support into both subject matter and method. This self-referential strategy reveals the hidden labour of curatorial practice, exposing the often-invisible economies that sustain the art world.

The intervention ultimately raised R 948.90, offering a provocative commentary on the value and vulnerability of live art within broader socio-economic frameworks.

Curator at work was performed as a daily public intervention at the National Arts Festival 2024 (Makhanda, South Africa). 

Created and performed by Gavin Krastin

Dramaturgy and documentation by Alan Parker