The cultural center of RuruHaus in Kassel, Germany serves as the ground zero for Documenta 15. For the first time, Jakarta-based arts collective Ruangrupa is curating the event. It is also leading a delegation of local artists who will take part in Documenta's various forums.
The AAA show takes place at Fridericianum - one of the world's first public museums, founded in 1779. The curators of the Fridericianum are transforming the Fridericianum into a temporary, experimental school for the duration of the exhibition, explains the team of AAA, which includes John Tain, Susanna Chung, Ozge Ersoy and Samira Bose.
Preparations are made for the 1967 Fine Arts Fair at the Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda. The image is part of the Asia Art Archive display at Documenta 15. The presentation reflects how artists and collectives study, document, interpret and disseminate cultural knowledge, and foregrounds the active roles that artists themselves play in preserving and mediating such knowledge.
A performance art festival in Hong Kong took place in 2006, where artists from the mainland joined their local counterparts. The AAA team pointed out that Hong Kong was a meeting point to exchange ideas and experiment with art forms across different art communities.
In November 2021 a meeting was held at Fridericianum School in Documenta 15 s Fridskul. Our display emphasizes the work of artists who wear different hats: they are not only visual artists but also educators, writers, organizers, and archivists at the same time. This goes back to one of the main questions that Ruangrupa asks: How do we think of artists beyond their individual contributions to the cultural field? Documenta 15 is inspired by the idea of lumbung communal rice barns in rural Indonesia.
As part of the public program, AAA will collaborate with collectives at talks and workshops on topics including archive-based storytelling, creative tools for arts education, and how artists share resources.