Movers and Shakers: Public Program

The Other Transatlantic: The Curatorial and Exhibitory Challenges of Optical and Kinetic Art
Dr. Abigail Winograd

Date: 19 May 2025
Time: 17.30 – 18.30 London
Venue: Lecture Theatre, Marshgate, UCL East
     
Abigail will deliver this lecture remotely from the US, you are welcome to join us in the lecture theatre at Marshgate or online, the lecture will be followed by a reception for those attending in person. 

Online audience members – please register here. 
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

On the 19 May 2025 Abigail Winograd will deliver a keynote lecture on the eve of the start of a four-day workshop Movers and Shakers: Strategies for the Conservation of Kinetic Art, organised by the Getty Conservation Institute, the MSc in the Conservation of Kinetic Art and Media (History of Art) UCL East and Tate. 

Abstract
The Other Transatlantic: The Curatorial and Exhibitory Challenges of Optical and Kinetic Art

The keynote will focus on the conceptualization, planning, and execution of The Other Transatlantic: Kinetic and Op Art in Eastern Europe and Latin America, an exhibition which explored the confluence of enthusiasms in Soviet, non-aligned, and Latin American countries for two frequently overlooked and/or critically derided movements that flourished from the 1950s through the 1970s. The Other Transatlantic tracked a web of relationships between artists from Caracas to Moscow, São Paulo to Zagreb, and Buenos Aires to Warsaw writing an alternative history of abstraction in the second half of the Twentieth century that bypassed the so-called centers of western art. While artists in New York and Paris argued the relative merits of minimalism, Pop, and conceptualism, these artistic practices centered around an entirely different set of aesthetic concerns: philosophies of art and culture dominated by notions of progress and science, the machine and engineering, construction and perception. Opening first in Warsaw at the Museum of Modern Art in 2016 before traveling to the Garage in Moscow and SESC Pinheiros in São Paulo, The Other Transatlantic included the work of 36 artists and dozens of objects in various states of conservation. The lecture will likewise consider the challenges posed by the precarious nature of the works and their reliance on increasingly fragile technologies.

Artists’ Panel 
Rie Nakajima, Hannah Perry and Bao Rong will discuss themes of movement, breakdown, maintenance, and repair in their work with Pip Laurenson, Professor of Conservation UCL.

Date: 21 May 2025
Time: 16:00 – 17.30  
Venue: Education Management Suite, 603, Marshgate, UCL East
 
This artists’ panel is part of a 4 day workshop Movers and Shakers: Strategies for the Conservation of Kinetic Art, organised by the Getty Conservation Institute, the MSc in the Conservation of Kinetic Art and Media (History of Art) UCL East and Tate. There will be a performance by Rie Nakajima.

Electric Dreams: Art and Technology Before the Internet
Dr. Valentina Ravaglia 

Date: 22 May 2025
Time: 17.30 – 18.30 London
Venue: Lecture Theatre, Marshgate, UCL East

The lecture will be followed by a reception held in the Education Management Suite, Level 7, Marshgate, UCL East      

On the 22 May 2025 the curator for the exhibition Electric Dreams: Art and Technology Before the Internet currently on at Tate Modern will deliver a keynote lecture as part of a four-day workshop Movers and Shakers: Strategies for the Conservation of Kinetic Art, organised by the Getty Conservation Institute, the MSc in the Conservation of Kinetic Art and Media (History of Art) UCL East and Tate. 

Abstract
This presentation expands on the contents and curatorial framing of the current Tate Modern exhibition Electric Dreams: Art and Technology Before the Internet (28 November 2024 – 1 June 2025). The exhibition presents a network of stories about artists who found inspiration in the methods and tools of science and technology to amplify the formal possibilities and sensorial reach of their work, looking at the evolution of mechanical and algorithmically-generated art between the 1950s and the early 1990s and connecting the work of early innovators in the fields of kinetic, optical and programmed art with the rise of digital art. In this talk, Ravaglia will focus on certain key moments in the exhibition that more overtly address the intersection with the histories of kinetic art, including movements such as ZERO, Gutai, Jikken Kobo, Arte Programmata, New Tendencies and Experiments in Art and Technology. The curatorial narrative also paid special attention to the histories of transnational display platforms and key shows where artists with a shared interest in technology and kineticism showed together, from London’s Signals Gallery and the legendary Cybernetic Serendipity exhibition of 1968 to the Nove Tendencije events in Zagreb, the Osaka Expo 1970 and the Centro de Arte y Comunicación in Buenos Aires. The talk will also address a certain ‘DIY’ attitude often driving artists to tinker with laboratory equipment consumer electronics for a range of creative, critical and emancipatory purposes, along with early collaborations and exchanges between engineers and artists, pushing the boundaries of each field of practice and sometimes dreaming up new technological possibilities made possible by the interplay between artistic and scientific imaginaries. 

If you have any questions about these events, please contact: p.laurenson@ucl.ac.uk

Image: Umbrella, 1971, Wen-Ying Tsai. © 2024 Tsai Art and Science Foundation/
Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York
Photo: © Tate / Tate Images