An interview with curator Roger McDonald

Roger Christopher McDonald PhD.

Born in Tokyo, Japan (1971). Roger McDonald was educated in the United Kingdom, studying International Politics (BA, Wales), Mysticism and Religious Experience (MA, Kent) and received a PhD in History and Theory of Art from the University of Kent in 2000. He has been based in Tokyo, Japan since 2000.

His curatorial work has included exhibitions in a number of non-gallery sites including a forest in Kiyosato, Japan, his home in London, a kindergarten in Tokyo, a disused restaurant and working vegetable market in Naha city Okinawa, a night club in Tokyo and an ongoing touring exhibition from a suitcase in the ‘Moving Collection’ project (Tokyo, Okinawa, Fukui, New Zealand). He was assistant curator to Fumio Nanjo for The Yokohama Triennale 2001. He was a co-curator for the major Japanese contemporary art exhibition ‘Mediarena’, held at The Govett Brewster Art gallery, New Zealand in 2004. He is a co-curator for ‘Green Times’ (opening autumn 2005), the inaugural exhibition for a new park culture centre in Tachikawa, Tokyo, which looks into the role of green spaces and parks in cities with a focus on the way people use such spaces. He maintains a weblog called The Tactical Museum where he publishes news about autonomous activities in Japan as well as his research interests into different forms of curatorial practice: http://rogermc.blogs.com/tactical/

He is Deputy Director of the Tokyo non profit arts collective AIT (Arts Initiative Tokyo) and co-organises its independent study school programme called MAD (Making Art Different), which amongst other courses, offers the first contemporary curating course in Japan. AIT emphasises a collective curatorial and working approach, and within this framework he has co-organised the ongoing ‘AIT Hour Museum’ series of exhibition/ events as well as the irregular lounge club night ‘Minglius’. In 2004 he travelled to Weimar, Germany to represent AIT in the exhibition ‘Even the Moon is Not Autonomous’, an archive and exhibition of socially engaged practices from Japan. AIT has recently been initiating a series of research and exhibition platforms exploring notions of the Public now in Tokyo and beyond.

Roger McDonald also teaches on the arts management course of Tama Art University, Tokyo, as well as being a visiting tutor at Zokei Art University. He has also lectured at the California College of Arts, San Francisco, Tate Britain, UK, The Japan Foundation, Tokyo amongst other places.


RJ says:
Hello Roger.

Roger McDonald says:
Hello.

RJ says:
I am interested to know if you have worked as a curator in Singapore in the past.

Roger McDonald says:
No. My involvement in the biennale will be the first time I have a curatorial involvement with Singapore.

RJ says:
What ideas does Singapore conjure up for you? I myself for instance moved here from UK and had some preconceived ideas about the place. What were yours?

Roger McDonald says:
I suppose, like many people, I had pre-formed images of the place - cleanliness comes to mind as a strong one...and one that many Japanese also, mentioned as soon as I start talking about SG...I knew that it was a very small city state with an interesting history for me personally...being part Japanese and part British...and the fact that Singapore was a site where these two countries faced off and surrendered to one another. There is one very interesting painting done during ww2 in the museum of modern art Tokyo, depicting the British surrender to the Japanese in Singapore....every time I look at this painting, which shows despondent British generals and strong Japanese generals, it makes me feel strange!

Roger McDonald says:
I am trying to remember the name of the artist, but it’s not there now. Anyway, Singapore was this place in SE Asia where 2 countries clashed over imperialist ambitions. The battle box displays in fort canning were an interesting dimension to all this history I thought. I went with Fumio Nanjo when we first came and both talked about this aspect - its one of the few places the British lost to an Asian country! Anyway, I don’t want to dwell too much on this, but I also think its something which cannot be easily brushed aside. It informs so much in Singapore...one of the major biennale venues is the city hall...a place very much connected to all of this...

RJ says:
Yes yes!

RJ says:
You have worked with Fumio Nanjo before I believe. What about Ms Pereira and Dr Tan?

Roger McDonald says:
Yup, I worked with Fumio on the first Yokohama Triennale back in 2001 - Japan’s first large scale international exhibition really. I was his assistant curator and we worked with about 40 artists from different places. It was an amazing experience...I had just returned to Tokyo after completing my PhD (history and theory of art) at Kent Uni. UK...and was looking for work in the contemporary arts. My timing was good and I had the good fortune to work with Fumio, one of the important curators of the last 20 years in Japan I think. This experience has given me a better perspective working on the SB...for example, I remember for Yokohama I would try to answer all of the intricate requests from all artists, which after a while was just physically impossible...especially during the installation period when artists are on site, all needing various materials and support...I eventually learnt to 'let go', understanding that as a curator one can actually make much more tactical choices and priorities...artists eventually find ways to realise things! Of course the immense help of many many volunteers and staff was invaluable and amazing..something i really hope we can replicate for SB too.

Roger McDonald says:
As for working with Sharmini and Eugene, I knew Sharmini from London. I think we had met at openings while I was studying in London. I did not know Eugene before SB, but they knew each other...I think we have a great team for SB. We each bring different sets of interests and skills and experiences to the table. Fumio is a very 'open' kind of Director I think. He will listen to everyone's views and choices and engage in debate.

RJ says:
For someone so young Roger, you have traveled far and wide and done so much. What are the lessons you are hoping to learn from SB? Tell me what you perceive as being your biggest challenge here as a curator.

Roger McDonald says:
Thank you...actually traveling far and wide is something i am not a super fan of! I think about this myself a lot, and think that because I was sent to boarding school in England at age 8, I now prefer to be more rooted in one place and develop relationships there. Being in Tokyo for the past 5 years and being involved in starting Arts Initiative Tokyo (AIT), the non profit curatorial collective I am involved with, has thus been very important and a pleasure for me. I think there is of course an important place for a more global form of curating, utilising networks and cities across the world, but i think it perhaps can also easily lead to 'easy' approaches to exhibition making. SB has been an opportunity for me to firstly learn about SE Asian contemporary art and artists, and to travel to several countries. Working on large exhibitions like SB also makes you aware of the political nature of such endeavors today, something I also experienced during Yokohama 2001. As someone who has never worked in an art museum or gallery, biennales have been a window into a specific, but now very prevalent form of exhibition making in the world today. They are about branding, tourism and a sense of place-ness as well as about education, experimentation, risk and art.

Roger McDonald says:
Just to add something....I think it is interesting that someone like me, with no museum background can today operate as a curator in the contexts of a biennale exhibition. Perhaps until recently, it was difficult for independent curators or non-aligned operators to engage with exhibition projects of this scale...since the 1990s, this seems to have changed.

RJ says:
Sure.

RJ says:
Singapore is an island. Streams and the sea surround it and one consequence of this is that much arrives on its beaches. This represents people, cultures, civilization and its mixtures. It thus also represents the position of Singapore - a possibility for Asia which maintains ideas of fragmentation and coexistence, flux and tradition, colors and emotion. In this multi-cultural and trans-cultural discourse, the dichotomy of modernist value systems lose their meanings and new possibilities can emerge.

And Peter Schoppert once eloquently suggested, "“Singapore is about routes, not roots: an intersection point of the trajectories of a thousand journeys, Singapore is the sum of a hundred diaspora: at night, it seems everyone is dreaming about somewhere else.”

RJ says:
The above topics are close to my heart as an artist. What about you Roger?

RJ says:
I guess I am alluding to your suggestion earlier about the sense of place-ness.If we dream of other places, can the Biennale bring us back?

Roger McDonald says:
Yes, indeed. Singapore certainly seems to be read as a place of flows; of crossings and co-existence....there is not much space physically to make roots perhaps! As someone with a mixed background, I can very much understand such sentiments. It’s an interesting proposition you just suggest. The biennale 'bringing Singaporeans back'....to where i wonder....a fixed place? Or somewhere ambiguous, like a dream? From personal experience, I find that it is the situation I find myself in that gives me a sense of being...for example, when I go back to UK, after a few days, I think my mind starts to adjust itself to being British. Language finds itself again and I begin to move differently to how I move in Tokyo. This sense of re-tuning, of adjustment is I think something very interesting - and for SB, I hope that our engagement with using religious venues may encourage people to have similar experiences of adjusting - each religious space I have visited confronts you with having to change slightly...one's demeanor, way of walking or speaking perhaps. This kind of experience is something I hope audiences can share in through SB.....

RJ says:
Yes, yes, I was sure you would have an insight into it and I thank you for sharing it with us.

RJ says:
I have interviewed several Biennale artists for my blog in the last two weeks. It has been fun and very instructive. The theme of the Biennale, 'Belief' was a subject I engaged in with many of them - each had a different response. One chord was on its hugeness/largeness as well as its present ness. What do you think Roger?

RJ says:
I mean what do you think about the theme of SB and how does it move you? Is it something that you identify yourself with? Was it meant to point to the multi-ethnicity of Singapore? Or was it something to do with the issues of the world today?

Roger McDonald says:
Sure...belief is certainly a wide word. It strikes a chord with me though...it’s a word which almost everyone can relate to I think...in some way, perhaps very personal, religious, or more philosophically. It can be a useful word to trigger thinking about multiple issues that impact our everyday life and the wider world today. Its relation to art and art history is also long and important....the relationships which have existed in many cultures between religious belief and its expressions through art. I am interested in thinking about the implications of believing in something today....in a world where economic liberalism and capital dominate, is there space to believe? Belief has no doubt also mutated and found new forms and styles...perhaps it is possible now to have 'one minute beliefs'....or rotate beliefs according to one's predicament or fashion? Traditional religious belief remains strong of course across the world, as does beliefs in an array of 'alternative' belief systems, the occult and conspiracies. I suppose there are not so many moments these days in our everyday lives when we are actually confronted to state our beliefs...to say 'I believe in....'.....politicians change their minds very easily....so in all of this, what is the space for belief? Is there a space for belief? Is it possible to believe in something and also not believe in it - to simultaneously juggle seemingly incompatible beliefs??

Roger McDonald says:
But hopefully Belief can provide a kind of trigger, through which to think about many significant issues confronting the world and our everyday lives today.

Roger McDonald says:
Religious venues was one symbolic way to explore this.....City Hall is also a strong symbolic architecture expressive of ideology and the idea of the nation-state.....Orchard Road, is perhaps somewhere dream-like, a floating world of commerce and consumption.

RJ says:
Yes and thanks Roger. Wonderful. A few more questions and I will be done.

RJ says:
Tell me what comes next for you Roger?

Roger McDonald says:
Parallel to SB, are ongoing activities of AIT in Tokyo...I teach there as part of our MAD programme of classes....also at university in Japan....so there is some juggling going on here. In September, after the biennale opens, we are currently co-organising a think tank 2 day forum in Tokyo with several art institutions from Scotland and a wonderfully interesting curator called Clementine Deliss. We hope to think about the future of the art academy...mobility, kinds of knowledge which may inform or feed into/ off art, and about the future of the institution...this may feed into one of the magazine projects within next year's Documenta 12.

RJ says:
Brilliant. One final question.. What influence do you think 'street art' is exerting on the scape of visual arts today? How does it matter if at all? How will paintings and art appreciation change?

Roger McDonald says:
Well, I think its always been there....Schwitters.....Hi Red center (Japan).....Fluxus....and its a problematic distinction in some senses...but definitely one that is being raised more these days. I don’t think that 'street art' is any more 'authentic' or 'radical' because it is called that - this seems often to be an underlying assumption in such debates. AIT organised a collaboration event with a German artist - Johannes Wohnseifer (who made a similar skate event with Mark Gonzales), and a pro skate boarder, Shin Okada (Japan), in Tokyo couple of years back...Johannes built these light wood sculptures of famous Tokyo land-marks, like Tokyo tower and the Mori building. Shin proceeded to skate around them, using ramps made out of wood and old tatami mats propped against walls...to the MC and sounds of his crew. the action ended with Shin skating through each model sculpture....flying through the air and utterly destroying the sculptures.....that was very good....crushed sculptures, sweaty skaters and happy people.

RJ says:
Thank you Roger. Appreciate you taking the time to do this.

Roger McDonald says:
Thanks for the good questions.