Asep Topan

In 2022, 41 contemporary art curators, researchers, and museum directors from 24 different countries were awarded to attend the CIMAM 2022 Annual Conference. The CIMAM 2022 Annual Conference, titled "The Attentive Museum. Permeable Practices for a Common Ground", was held in Mallorca (Balearic Islands), Spain on 11–13 November, hosted by Es Baluard Museu d'Art Contemporani de Palma.

Asep Topan's Conference Report

As the world changes, so do museums. The CIMAM 2022 Conference ‘The Attentive Museum. Permeable Practices for a Common Ground’ is one of the attempts how to discuss these changes and re-thinking museum practices at large. I appreciate the program aims to hold a three-day conference that creates a place for different voices to be heard and initiate a platform for networking among different agents in contemporary art.

One of the key takeaways from the conference comes from the first day of the event, which is the presentation by Meskerem Assegued Bantiwalu, Curator and General Director, Zoma Museum PLC, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Not only did she introduce the program of Zoma Museum to the audience, but she also explains how the museum has been built from rough land into the museum building and considered both the environment and the public in the making. For me, it is important to hear more about museum context from Africa, Asia, or maybe South America that does not merely show the museum’s sophisticated list of programs, artists, and shiny buildings –– like we often see from the museum in the western world. An open-eye presentation and a very much inspiring place to be, as Zoma Museum shows us the museum can be a place for people, humbly organized, warm, and welcoming. On the other note, I believe the presentation from artists on the second day is very much important, as we can understand different perspectives apart from curators or museum directors.

Furthermore, I found this conference was very well organized and balanced in the sense of program arrangements such as the conference itself, studio visits, museum visits, and networking sessions. I believe that making a three-day conference in three different venues was not easy, especially when you have hundreds of guests to accommodate. Nevertheless, everything goes smoothly and the whole event went successfully as scheduled. Personally, I think Mallorca is a great place for this: a relatively small town with every place are walking distance and vibrant art communities inside. All studio and museum visits were done mostly by walking, which was also great for experiencing the city. As the organizer explained, and I personally felt too, the networking part perhaps is one of the main things in this event. I manage to meet some colleagues I knew before, and gratefully expanded my network with new people in the museum and art world at the same time. As an independent curator, it is noteworthy to find another person who shared the same interest and visions and opens the possibility to collaborate in the future.