Supported by Outset since 2009, the Cubitt Curatorial Fellowship is a unique opportunity for research and curatorial experimentation in the field of visual arts, based on an 18-month residency, the only such scheme in the UK and one of very few in the world. This includes an initial 3-month research and fundraising period, followed by 15 months of programming. It gives emerging curators the opportunity to curate one of the UK’s most established artist-run spaces.
Morgan Quaintance was the 10th curatorial opportunity recipient, with his programme running from October 2015 until June 2016.
Quaintance's programme opened with Software, Hard Problem (8th October – 15th November 2015) a group exhibition that broadly explored artists use of software to surmount aesthetic, philosophical or theoretical problems. With a title that nodded to philosopher and cognitive scientist David Chalmer’s well-known and popular distinction between the easy and ‘hard problem’ of consciousness (between explaining neurological processes and explaining subjective experience), Software, Hard Problem explored artificial intelligence, algorithmic painting, and artists’ mastery and transcendence of pre-packaged digital tools. It featured artists Cécile B. Evans, Lawrence Lek and Manfred Mohr, along with a selection of artefacts and documents.
Smile Orange (26th November 2015 – 17th January 2016) was the second exhibition featuring Russell Newell, Karl Ohiri, and Ben Sanderson. A group show of painting, photography and video works, it explored dynamics of identity formation - and their reliance on history and memory) - from a personal, communal and national perspective. Rather than presenting objects as fixed statements, Smile Orange operated as a support structure allowing the following questions to be posed: Who am I? Who are we? What is a nation?
The third exhibition in the cycle (28th January – 28th February, 2016) was conceived alongside musician and performer Dean Blunt.
Every exhibition was accompanied by a series of talks, broadcast as part of the radio programme Studio Visit and realised in conjunction with Resonance 104.4FM.
