Overview

​​Non-profit art spaces and institutions provide a crucial lifeline for cultural producers and artists, especially those who have been historically underrepresented or are outside western art centres. A plethora of dynamic initiatives and platforms around the world step in to ensure that opportunities, mentorship and learning for such artists’ practices are sustained.

This panel surveys the work of art outfits and collectives operating within the contemporary contexts of Palestine, South Asia and Africa that seek to re-centre such practitioners as critical agents of our common human future.

In providing room for radical experimentation and the shaping of new social discourse, how do such spaces shape the future of cultural production? In what ways do these institutions facilitate innovative pathways for practitioners and curators with regard to professional development, education and knowledge production? Whose ‘futurity’ do these platforms actually speak to and what constituencies do they seek to strengthen and support?