Paper short abstract:

During my doctoral research project I have been interested in exploring the role of materiality in managing community art events. I have examined the ways in which material objects, such as artworks and photographs, mediate social agencies of differently situated subjects in a social field.

Paper long abstract:

I have explored the potential of materiality in creating relationships between humans but also between human and non-human agents. I also looked at the memory of the artistic events.

During fieldwork I focused on the notion of personhood and looked at how it is being crafted through one's participation in a community art project. I was interested in investigating the type of values that are transmitted. I therefore discussed some of the practices of dealing with objections (Mosse 2006) as a way of managing community art projects. The final shape of the project is an issue of renegotiation, as public institutions also aim to take some control over the meanings shared by the 'project community'. I was interested in learning how these reflect on what takes place through collaboration set up in the name of the common good.