Abstract/Summary

The language of ‘care’ is trending in institutional presentations of contemporary art, where the value of representation is equated with a form of institutional care. Through the maintenance of administrative and bureaucratic systems that consolidate power within their own managerial infrastructures, however, these same cultural institutions internally obfuscate routes towards care for the relationships critical to the production of art that institutions seek to exhibit. This thesis argues for a different form of relating in the production of art by tracing and defining working forms of ‘critical intimacy’ – an awareness, sensitivity and care for relationships between individuals who temporarily gather around institutions in the act of art production. Definitions and examples of critical intimacy are traced within a constellation of texts I have written, published and circulate in the public domain in the form of essays, lectures, books, talks, exhibition guides, blog posts, liner notes, surveys, programme notes; and refers to the output of Renée Green, Pat Hearn and Ian White, among others. My published works consistently argue for ongoing dialogues between cultural workers in order to effect lasting and sustainable change on interpersonal and institutional levels. This thesis asks: In what ways do relationships within and around artistic institutions effect the material conditions of an institutional art world? And what does ‘art work’ look like when practiced through a reflexive approach of working in relation to, and in dialogue with others? By evidencing personal connections forged across different institutional art environments, this thesis proposes a continuous production of intimacy, friendship and collective labour that has the ability to creatively transform systemic disparities unmet by institutions at large. My research examines this emergent condition of critical intimacy as a by-product of a failing art institutional model, and assesses its impact on artists, curators, and workers within contemporary art institutions.