Ronald Kolb
Post-Exhibitionary Practice

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https://www.vector.org.ro/portfolio-items/vector-curating-beyond-exhibition/?portfolioCats=5

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Ronald Kolb, “Situated Knowledges & Pastoral Power in Post-Exhibitionary Practices,” pp. 22–35

In: Curating beyond Exhibition: On the Post-Exhibitionary Condition in a Post-Political World
Eds. Cătălin Gheorghe & Mick Wilson
Authors: Andris Brinkmanis, Zian Chen, Biljana Ciric, Maria Hlavajova, Ronald Kolb, Saara Mildeberg, Vipash Purichanont, Raluca Voinea

Series: Vector – Critical Research in Context, ArtMonitor, 2025
Print ISBN 978-91-989730-2-0
PDF ISBN 978-91-989730-3-7
174 pp.

A collaboration between Vector, CAPIm (Centre for Art and the Political Imaginary), ICMA (Institute for Multidisciplinary Research in Art) at UNAGE Iași, EARN (European Artistic Research Network) – Curatorial Studies WG, “George Enescu” National University of the Arts (UNAGE), Iasi, Romania, University of Gothenburg, HDK-Valand Academy of Art and Design

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Published in the Vector series — Critical Research in Context, a collaboration between institutions in Iași and Gothenburg — the chapter extends Kolb’s post-exhibitionary framework into questions of pastoral power: the quieter, caring forms of governance that also shape how exhibitions organise their publics.

Extending his doctoral research, Kolb reads curating through Foucault’s „pastoral power“ — governance through care rather than repression, like a shepherd’s flock — combined with Haraway’s situated knowledges. Curators have long occupied this role, he argues, but their care usually goes to artists and artworks, not the public; and claims of „horizontal“ curating often mask rather than dissolve real power asymmetries.

Testing this against Art as Ecological Practice at Arthur Boskamp-Stiftung — a visit to gardener Wiebke Habbe, Field Narratives‘ field walk, Byungseo Yoo’s fermentation project — Kolb finds none fully escapes hierarchy, even at their most participatory. His conclusion: post-exhibitionary practice isn’t one grand alternative format, but small, situated acts — walking, tasting, fermenting — that stay accountable rather than claiming false neutrality.