The Moment of Curation

The following is an excerpt from my text “Artists, Curators, and Curator-Artists – The Poles of Authorship” translated from Serbian.

The Moment of Curation

The contemporary era is not the only period in which the concepts of the curator and the artist have been examined. In ancient Greece, renowned philosophers laid the foundations of both scientific and artistic thought. Socrates, who wandered through Athens urging people to think, never wrote down his own words. Everything known about his life and school of thought comes through the writings of his student and, later, the equally influential philosopher Plato.

The fact that it was Plato, rather than Socrates himself, who recorded Socrates’ ideas creates a certain ambiguity, and readers are often unaware that some of the ideas attributed to Plato actually originated with Socrates. One reason for this confusion is that all of these works bear Plato’s name as their author. Consequently, it is difficult to determine which of Plato’s books are, in essence, Socrates’ works and which genuinely belong to Plato himself. This has also led to frequent debates in academic circles, as many scholars criticize Plato’s philosophy for its paradoxical and contradictory ideas. Plato himself acknowledged that he did not agree with all of his own ideas; however, today, without careful analysis, it is extremely difficult to distinguish which ideas were truly Plato’s and which belonged to Socrates.

The famous philosophical work The Republic is attributed to Plato as its author, and most people refer to it simply as “Plato’s Republic,” even though Socrates is the central character and narrator throughout the dialogue. It is precisely here that the intriguing artist–curator relationship emerges: Socrates functions as the artist who generates ideas, while Plato merely records them. Nevertheless, since Plato was also an original thinker in his own right, it is more accurate to regard him as a curator-artist. On the one hand, he documented Socrates’ thoughts, selecting and presenting them in the role of a curator; on the other hand, he was himself the author of philosophical works. What makes Plato a curator is precisely his choice of Socrates as the individual whose work he would “represent” and present to the world.

Socrates and Plato are not the only examples of the curator–artist relationship in antiquity. The surviving accounts of Diogenes should also be considered. Many people are familiar with the humorous and provocative stories about Diogenes. Like Socrates, Diogenes never wrote down his own words, so the only evidence of his existence and his ideas comes from the writings of various historians. It is important to note that Diogenes and Plato are said to have had numerous philosophical disagreements. Plato idealized Socrates and chose him as the artist whose work he would curate, whereas, by criticizing Diogenes, he effectively rejected him, as a curator, as an artist worthy of representation.

Since Diogenes was not chosen by anyone to represent him within this curator–artist relationship, he becomes something akin to an independent artist who creates simply for the sake of creation. By contrast, Socrates represents the accepted, chosen artist, one who creates in pursuit of a higher purpose—in this particular case, philosophical truth.

The well-known story of Alexander the Great and Diogenes illustrates what I call the moment of curation: the moment in which one chooses an artist or a work of art. Alexander the Great came to Athens with the intention of meeting Diogenes after hearing numerous stories about him. After a long journey, he found the eccentric philosopher lying in a meadow, basking in the sun. Alexander approached him and asked whether there was anything he could do for him, to which Diogenes replied: “Stand out of my sunlight.”

Following this unexpected response, Alexander returned to his empire and uttered the famous words: “If I were not Alexander, I would wish to be Diogenes.”

This is Alexander’s curatorial moment—a moment that any ordinary person can experience. After visiting numerous museums, listening to various genres of music, and reading books from different fields, an individual may eventually experience such a curatorial moment, after which they unconsciously become, in a certain sense, the curator of the artist—or the art—they have personally chosen. A person becomes a curator because, after encountering a work of art, they feel compelled to speak about that artist or artwork, first to those closest to them and then to wider circles.

These small curatorial moments experienced by ordinary people can transform an artist or a work of art into a historical artifact that will be presented to future generations and thereby become part of cultural heritage. More precisely, what we today call “fans” are, in this sense, precisely curators.