Margarita Kuleva: Cultural Work in Wartime Russia (and Beyond)

The event takes a standpoint of critical cultural sociology to discuss artistic production in contemporary Russia since February 2022 and the professional trajectories of those cultural workers who recently left Russia. The event will include a talk by Dr Margarita Kuleva, Jordan Center postdoc, followed by a roundtable discussion. In her talk, Margarita will present some results of her project ‘The Right to Be Creative’, which includes an empirical study of the Russian contemporary art community in their reaction to the war in Ukraine. The project looks specifically at antiwar protest as a series of open manifestations, as well as hidden political struggles behind the closed doors of cultural institutions and artist studios. The roundtable aims to give the opportunity for international cultural workers to speak out on the subject.
Dr Margarita (Rita) Kuleva is an art sociologist, performance artist and curator. Currently an NYU Jordan Center postdoc and visiting professor at Tufts University (Artist Protection Fund Fellow), she had to leave Russia as a critic of the war in Ukraine. Before February 2022, she was Associate Professor and Chair of Design and Contemporary Art Department at Higher School of Economics - St Petersburg. In her research and art projects, she mainly uses ethnography and performance as methods. She is interested in exploring social inequalities in artistic production and boundaries in access to culture. In particular, her PhD was devoted to the ‘behind the scenes’ of cultural institutions to give greater visibility to the invisible workers of culture. It was one of the first systematic studies on post-Soviet creative labour. Some findings from these studies are presented in recent journal publications, including Cultural Studies (2018) and European Journal of Cultural Studies (2022). She has worked with many international cultural institutions, including Manifesta Biennale, Pushkin House in London, and more.
Dalida María Benfield is an artist-researcher and theorist (Panama/US/Finland). Her work is focused on mobilizing decolonial feminist aesthetics toward pluriversal world-creation. She is the author of numerous journal articles and book chapters, as well as co-editor of special issues of journals as Urgent Pedagogies (Stockholm, Sweden: IASPIS, 2023), and is the co-editor of the books, Affecting Technologies/Machining Intelligences (São Paulo, Brazil and Boston, MA, US: CAD+SR, 2021) and Tiempos Migratorios (Migratory Times). She writes and publishes in English and Spanish. Her work has also been published in translation to French, Portuguese, and Russian. In 2017, she co-founded the Center for Arts, Design, and Social Research (CAD+SR) and is its Research and Programs Director. Benfield holds an M.F.A. in Video/Film (School of the Art Institute of Chicago), and a M.A. and Ph.D. in Comparative Ethnic Studies with Designated Emphasis in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (University of California-Berkeley).
Susan Katz is the Program Director of CEC ArtsLink and has more than 25 years experience in the field of transnational cultural exchange and directs CEC ArtsLink’s Art Prospect Program in public art, social practice art, and professional development in post-Soviet countries She works closely with a diverse network of international partner organizations, funders, and artists to develop, finance, and coordinate the collaborative activities of the Art Prospect Network. Susan has a Ph.D. in public administration (cultural policy) from New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service and wrote her dissertation on the development of nonprofit cultural organizations in Russia.
Ou Ning is the director of the documentaries 𝘚𝘢𝘯 𝘠𝘶𝘢𝘯 𝘓𝘪 (2003) and 𝘔𝘦𝘪𝘴𝘩𝘪 𝘚𝘵𝘳𝘦𝘦𝘵 (2006); chief curator of the Shenzhen & Hong Kong Bi-city Biennale of Urbanism\Architecture (2009); jury member of 8th Benesse Prize at 53rd Venice Biennale (2009); member of the Asian Art Council at the Guggenheim Museum (2011); founding chief editor of the literary journal 𝘊𝘩𝘶𝘵𝘻𝘱𝘢𝘩!(2010-2014); founder of the Bishan Project (2011-2016); a visiting professor at Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation (2016-2017); and a senior research fellow of the Center for Arts, Design, and Social Research in Boston (2020-2023).
Nikita Seleznev is a multi-media artist who studied sculpture at the St. Petersburg Stieglitz State Academy of Art and Design. Since 2018, Seleznev has had several solo exhibitions, including most recently Unfinished Proiect, The Boris Yeltsin Presidential Center, Ekaterinburg, (2021). His work has been featured in several group exhibitions as Los Atravesados, Treize gallery, Paris (2018); Horizon-19, New Museum of Modern Art, St. Petersburg (2019); I don’t know whether the Earth is spinning or not…, VIl Moscow International Biennale of Young Art (2020). His project Karate Poetry was shortlisted for the “Innovation-2021” State Prize in the “New Generation” category.