Call for Fellows: 2018 ArkDes Fellowship – "Projecting the Future"

ArkDes, Sweden’s national museum of architecture and design, has launched a new Fellowship programme offering practitioners, spatial thinkers, and researchers operating in or around the fields of architecture and design opportunities for interdisciplinary research.

The first annual Fellowship, which will begin in September 2018 and run until February 2019, is dedicated to the theme of Projecting the Future. It will provide four individuals, partnerships or groups from within the European Union space and resources to conduct exploratory work for a 6 month-long period in Stockholm.

An international jury—comprised of Maria Lind (Stockholm), Nikolaus Hirsc (Frankfurt, New York City), Liza Fior (London) and Behzad Khosravi Noori (Stockholm), chaired by ArkDes director Kieran Long—will collectively assess applications following the deadline for applications on March 19, 2018.

With the headline exhibition The Future Starts Here opening in 2019, ArkDes will become a centre for future studies. Sweden is an important territory in which to consider future trends; while semi-peripheral, it maintains a global impact on models of social governance and the creative industries. With a General Election around the corner (September 2018), questions surrounding immigration, politics, militarisation, and housing are currently reframing a debate about society and its relationship to the built environment.

The application process does not require a stipulated or tangible outcome; we expect any possible result of the programme to develop during the Fellows’ time at ArkDes, and from conversation with our curators, researchers, and guests. We are excited by the unconventional, experimental, contextually rich, and culturally engaged; proposals that can concisely advocate for an original position while, at the same time, offer convincing methodologies for research, communication and dissemination.

International Jury: Nikolaus Hirsch, Liza Fior, Behzad Khosravi Noori and Maria Lind (Bernd Krauss).

Nikolaus Hirsch is a Frankfurt-based architect, editor and curator. He was the director of Städelschule and Portikus in Frankfurt and currently teaches at Columbia University in New York. His realised projects include the Dresden Synagogue (2001), Hinzert Document Center (2006), Cybermohalla Hub (Delhi, 2008-12), Do We Dream Under The Same Sky (with Rirkrit Tiravanija), Museum of Immortality (Mexico City, 2016) and, currently, the conversion of the National Gallery in Prague. Hirsch curated numerous exhibitions at the Portikus, the Folly project for the Gwangju Biennale (2014), Real DMZ (2015), and “Wohnungsfrage” at HKW Berlin (2015). Hirsch is the co-founder and editor of the Critical Spatial Practice series at Sternberg Press and e-flux Architecture.

Liza Fior in a partner of muf architecture/art, a London-based practice working in the public realm (including museums). The practice brings unsolicited research into every project, working with those who know a place in order to articulate the value of the existing before moving onto discussions of the future. muf works primarily in East London, but not exclusively so. They are the only UK winners of the European Prize for Public Space (for Barking Town Square), and were the authors of the British Pavilion at the 2010 Venice Architecture Biennale. Fior has taught, lectured and been published internationally.

Behzad Khosravi Noori is an artist, writer and educator based in Stockholm. He has lectured widely and led theory and practice seminars about comparative art history (with a focus on microhistory), Islamic arts, as well as research based art practices. His work has been shown in various national and international exhibitions including Tensta Konsthall, Botkyrka Konsthall, MKC in Stockholm, Sakakini, Ramallah Palestine, the Arran Gallery Tehran, and the research pavilion at 2017 Venice Art Biennale. He is currently a PhD candidate at Konstfack’s Fine Art department in collaboration with the Department of Architecture at KTH Stockholm.

Maria Lind is a curator, writer and educator based in Stockholm, and is currently the director of Tensta konsthall. She was the artistic director of the 11^th Gwangju Biennale, the director of the graduate program at the Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College (2008-2010), and director of Iaspis in Stockholm (2005-2007). Between 2002-2004 she was the director of Kunstverein and in 1998, co-curator of Manifesta 2. Lind has taught widely since the early 1990s and is currently professor of artistic research at the Art Academy in Oslo. She has contributed widely to newspapers, magazines, catalogues and other publications. In 2009 Lind was the recipient of the Walter Hopp’s Award for Curatorial Achievement. In 2010 Selected Maria Lind Writing was published by Sternberg Press.

More information: https://arkdes.se/en/fellowships/

Images and interviews: Maria Östman, maria.ostman@arkdes.se