Over the last ten years, curating has been the object of an epistemological shift which scholars have named the ‘curatorial’ (Martinon, 2013). This defines a set of practices that go beyond curating-as-exhibition-making to embrace various other formats that are collaborative, open-ended and processual – research or archival projects, ‘educational’ forms such as talks and workshops, or curating in the digital space. Therefore, the ‘curatorial’ has become an expanded practice that produces fresh knowledge and alternative meanings.

In the same way that Conceptual art strategies of dematerialization of artworks could not totally bypass the question of their commodification, artists working with digital technologies are reviving the question of the economic, as well as the symbolic, focus on knowledge.

SIX YEARS’ current program draws on the question: WHAT DO CURATORS CARE FOR? to prompt a critical reflection about practices and principles of ‘care ethics’. Joan Tronto (2009) highlights how ‘care ethics’ is based on a system of interrelationships, empathies, mutual responsibilities and communications. Besides, Claire Bishop (2012) points out that since the emergence of the Web 2.0, in 2002, art, notably socially engaged art, has appropriated “a language of platforms, collaborations, activated spectators, and ‘prosumers’ [= informed consumers] who co-produce content (rather than passively consume information designed for them).”

WHAT DO CURATORS CARE FOR? aims to explore how the practice of “care” can be used as a tool for analysis or provocation. How can we apprehend “care ethics”, within the frame of the ‘curatorial’ while using the interrelational potentialities of the digital realm?

Arlène Berceliot-Courtin, Karin Schlageter and Francesca Zappia