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Paper short abstract:

'Instauring' (Souriau) is work-to-be-done, the impetus that a work has for completion. Curatorially, it contrasts with 'installation'. Are dreamings instaured in Aboriginal Australia? When such art is moved from country to city, does 'instauration' reconceptualise installation?

Paper long abstract:

'Instauring' is a concept from Etienne Souriau (Professor of Aesthetics at the Sorbonne in the early 20th century), picked up recently by Isabelle Stengers and Bruno Latour.* It refers to the 'oeuvre à faire' (the work-to-be-done), trying to capture the impetus that a work has for its own completion, a spark that is already there in its first moments of creation. In that, from a curatorial point of view, it is in contrast with 'installation', which is the presentation of works deemed complete.

This talk explores the utility of the concept of instauration for Aboriginal Australia, where the 'work-to-be-done' might exist virtually as a dreaming that is always-already poised for realisation in object, icon, song, dance, etc. When art objects are extracted from the context of performance, for instance from country to city, does 'instauration' offer a focus to think again about their installation?

* Étienne Souriau, The Different Modes of Existence, Introduction by Isabelle Stengers and Bruno Latour, Minnesota, 2015.

Discussant Melinda Hinkson.