THE MUSEUM YET TO COME. Exercises of institutional imagination
Museums understood as agonist spaces are the places for all the never written stories. In two directions: re-writing the past against the grain but also activating new forms of political imagination able to defy the rationality imposed by extractivism, neo-colonialism and semiocapitalism. To do so and in order to exercise the institutional imagination I would like to call for this talk the figure of "the museum yet to come" following the figure of the "yet to come" that Cuban theorist José Esteban Muñoz used in Cruising Utopia: The Then and There of Queer Futurity when describing the queer as something that has yet to arrive, that is not lived, as a negation of the here and the now and as an appeal towards the potentiality of the concrete possibility of a different world.
Pablo Martínez is educator and researcher. He has worked as head of programmes at the MACBA since 2016. He has been in charge of Education and Public Activities at the CA2M Centro de Arte Dos de Mayo, Móstoles, Madrid (2009–2016) and associate lecturer in the History of Contemporary Art at the Fine Arts faculty of the Complutense University of Madrid (2011–2015). He edits the et al. series of essays (MACBA-Arcàdia). His lines of research include educational work with the body, as well as research into the power of images to produce political subjectivity. He is editorial secretary of the academic research journal Re-visiones and a member of the research and action group on education, art and cultural practices Las Lindes. He has edited published publications including Arte actual. Lecturas para un espectador inquieto ("Art today: readings for a concerned spectator", CA2M, 2011) and No sabíamos lo que hacíamos. Lecturas para una educación situada ("We didn't know what we were doing: readings for a situated education", CA2M, 2016); he has curated exhibitions by Werker (2014) and Adelita Husni-Bey (2016).
Video recorded at Gothenburg City Library, 21 May 2019 as part of Who writes the future?, organised by L'Internationale Online and Valand Art Academy. Video editor: Camilla Topuntoli.
Related activities
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HDK-Valand
Climate Forum I
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–MACBA
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MACBA
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MACBA
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MACBA
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Lecture by Ramón GrosfoguelIn 1956, countries that were fighting colonialism by freeing themselves from both capitalism and communism dreamed of a third path, one that did not align with or bend to the politics dictated by Washington or Moscow. They held their first conference in Bandung, Indonesia.
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HDK-Valand
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HDK-Valand
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The Climate Forum is a series of online meetings hosted by HDK-Valand within L’Internationale’s Museum of the Commons programme. The series builds upon earlier research resulting in the (2022) book Climate: Our Right to Breathe and reaches toward emerging change practices.
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MACBA
The Open Kitchen. Map of edible tensions
with Marina Monsonís, Paisanaje and Ruralitzem
The MACBA Kitchen is a working group situated against the backdrop of ecosocial crisis. Participants in the group aim to highlight the importance of intuitively imagining an ecofeminist kitchen, and take a particular interest in the wisdom of individuals, projects and experiences that work with dislocated knowledge in relation to food sovereignty. -
MACBA
Spiral of Time
Sound is intangible and ephemeral, yet it can be one of the most distinguishing characteristics of the places it inhabits. Spiral of Time is a site-specific work, created and developed by the Dutch artist, composer, and researcher Edwin van der Heide, that explores sound and its relationship with space and time. This is a participatory time-based work, where meaning is created through active listening and the navigation of each person. The work is integrated in this page and can be accessed below. Furthermore, it will also be presented as an installation towards the end of 2025.
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HDK-Valand
Book Launch: Collective Study in Times of Emergency, Gothenburg
with Nick Aikens (L'Internationale Online / HDK-Valand) and Mills Dray (HDK-Valand), 17h00, Glashuset
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–MACBA
Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica
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–MACBAMuseo Reina Sofia
School of Common Knowledge 2025
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HDK-Valand
MA Forum in collaboration with LIO: Nkule Mabaso
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Open Call – School of Common Knowledge 2025
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HDK-Valand
Climate Forum IV
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MACBA
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HDK-Valand
MA Forum in collaboration with LIO: Nour Shantout
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MACBA
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MACBA
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–MACBA
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MACBA
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MACBA
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MACBA
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HDK-Valand
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Climate Forum I – Readings
Nkule MabasoEN esLand RelationsClimateHDK-Valand -
Algunos términos que guían a lumbung press: Definiendo “edición”
Erick BeltránEN eslumbungSituated OrganizationsMACBA -
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Svitlana MatviyenkoClimateClimate book launchHDK-Valand -
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Françoise VergèsClimateClimate book launchHDK-Valand -
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Ana Teixeira PintoClimateClimate book launchHDK-Valand -
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Léuli Eshrāghi, Katarina Pirak SikkuClimateClimate book launchHDK-Valand -
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Evidence, Activism And The Law in the Age of Post-Truth
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THE MUSEUM YET TO COME. Exercises of institutional imagination
Pablo MartínezHDK-ValandMACBA -
Onåbara (Unreachable)
Aleksander MotturiHDK-Valand -
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L’Internationale Public Statement on the recent events at MACBA
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L'Internationale statement in support of the decision to open "La Bestia y el soberano" (The Beast and the Sovereign)
L’Internationale ConfederationStatements and editorialsMACBA -
Our Movements Are Loud
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Tania Safura Adam, Aldemar MatiasMACBA -
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MACBA -
Opening Performance: Song for Many Movements, live on Radio Alhara
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Live set: Una carta de amor a la intifada global
PrecolumbianEN esInternationalismsSonic and Cinema CommonsPast in the PresentMACBA -
Climate Forum II – Readings
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Climate Forum IV – Readings
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