Art Metropole

#14569

Decolonizing Culture: Essays on the Intersection of Art and Politics

Writer

Anuradha Vikram

Date

2018

Publisher

Sming Sming Books

Format

Anthologies

Genre

Culture, Essays, Activism

Anuradha Vikram’s Decolonizing Culture is a collection of seventeen essays that address questions of race and gender parity in contemporary art spaces. Originally published between 2013 and 2017 through Daily Serving’s #Hashtags column, Vikram’s text considers the specifics of equality and representation in the context of current events in the field of arts and culture in the United States and internationally. The columns cover a number of racially charged incidents in arts institutions during this period that received significant press attention, but little meaningful analysis. Vikram examines how arts institutions construct space and select programming in accordance with their expectations of their audience, and how a disconnect between the realities of contemporary urban demographics and the leadership at many arts institutions has led to controversy and embarrassment on numerous occasions. Contrasting with these case studies in institutional exclusion are a number of profiles of artists and artworks that bring art’s potential for inclusivity to fruition, working within institutions as well as outside of them to bring change.