In all the wrong places: Curatorial Acts and Sites of Encounter

This presentation reflects on the spatial dynamics of working between and across different disciplinary fields. My background is in contemporary art and curation, but through teaching and leading an academic department in a fashion college, I have come to occupy a new space within fashion theory and practice. As my curatorial practice and research have evolved through these disciplinary meeting points, I will share some of the methods and tools I have used to navigate being both an insider and an outsider, moving between margins and peripheries. With recourse to Mieke Bal’s writing on curatorial acts, I build on her notion of the exhibition as a performative space and an ‘uncertain territory’ (2011) where these conflictual boundaries and tensions can co-exist.