On August 17, the Manchester University-run Whitworth Art Gallery reneged on an earlier decision to pull a statement in support of Palestine from the collective Forensic Architecture’s exhibition “Cloud Studies” (2021). Initially, the statement was removed following a meeting between the university’s vice president Nalin Thakkar and Israeli advocacy group United Kingdom Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI). Upon hearing of the removal, Forensic Architecture called for the exhibition to be withdrawn “with immediate effect.” However, Whitworth director Alistair Hudson has since attempted a compromise, announcing that the gallery would not only display the statement in its entirety, but also include a “space which gives voice to different perspectives on the issues raised by the exhibition and help contextualize them.” The statement, which originally hung by the exhibition’s entrance, read “Forensic Architecture Stands with Palestine” before detailing the “ethnic cleansing” that Palestinians are subjected to by “Israeli police and settlers,” prompting UKLFI to raise concerns about it being “one-sided,” and “falsely conflat[ing] Israelis and white supremacists.” Whitworth will undertake a review of its governance around approving new artistic content for the gallery.

On August 17, Arts Council Korea (ARKO) appointed Lee Young-chul as the artistic director for the South Korea Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale. Currently a professor of fine arts at Kaywon University of Art and Design, Lee has served as the chief curator of the second Gwangju Biennale (1997) and led the Nam June Paik Art Center (2008) and Asian Culture Center (2013). Titled “Campanella: The Swollen Sun,” the Pavilion references Italian philosopher Tommaso Campanella’s 1602 book La città del Sole (The City of the Sun), a utopian society where labor and goods are equally divided. Media artist and electroacoustic composer Yunchul Kim will be featured at the Pavilion, but according to The Korea Herald, the list of participating artists has not been finalized and the decision will ultimately be up to Lee. ARKO’s announcement follows a complaint in June that alleged a conflict of interest between a selection committee member and an applicant, which led to a restart of the screening process under a new committee of nine experts. 

The former South Korean minister of culture, sports and tourism Park Yangwoo will return to the Gwangju Biennale Foundation as the new president. The decision was announced by Gwangju mayor Lee Yong-seop on August 17 following deliberations by the Biennale’s recruitment committee. Park had previously led the Foundation from 2015 to 2017 before Sunjung Kim took up the role, and he was named minister of culture in 2019. In February this year, he retired from the ministry and started conducting the KBS Symphony Orchestra. His appointment follows ongoing disputes stemming from Kim’s tenure between the Foundation and the Biennale’s labor union, which had filed complaints of gapjil (abuse of power) against Kim in late April. Following an official investigation, the Ministry of Employment and Labor confirmed on July 27 Kim’s abusive behavior, unfair dismissal, and harassment in the workplace, while another joint investigation conducted from June 30 to July 9 by Gwangju’s city government and the Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism found no evidence of wrongdoing.

On August 12, Vietnamese multimedia artist Nguyễn Thị Thanh Mai was named the inaugural recipient of the Artist Excellence Award by The Factory Contemporary Arts Centre in Ho Chi Minh City. Mai’s community-based projects span installations, photography, and videos, and depict the lives of the underprivileged. Her 2014 project ID Card, for example, incorporates unused clothes from the Vietnamese migrants to question the concept of nationality. She will produce new works for her solo exhibition at The Factory in August 2022, which will travel to the Center for Art Patronage and Development in Hanoi in 2023. The biennial Artist Excellence Award recognizes contemporary artists who “contribute to the social landscape” through interdisciplinary practices and create works that spotlight diverse cultural voices, and comes with a VND 160 million (USD 7,000) prize.

Sydney’s Powerhouse Museum welcomes Mark Wilsdon as their new chief operating officer beginning in November. With over three decades of experience in the fields of art, culture, tourism, and hospitality, Wilsdon is currently the founding co-CEO of the Museum of Old and New Art in Tasmania and the non-executive board director at Tasmanian Tourism Industry Council. He also co-owns The Salty Dog Hotel in Kingston Beach. At Powerhouse, Wilsdon will oversee the transformation and renovation of the museum, including the renewal of Powerhouse Ultimo, which focuses on fashion and design, and the expansion of Powerhouse’s storage facility at Castle Hill.

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