Department: Tate Britain Curatorial
Host: Elena Crippa, Curator, Modern British Art
Feeding directly into the development of the Tate collection, Kenji carried out research on Asian artists who either studied or worked in Britain or developed their work in collaboration with British artists in the post-war period (1945 to 1970). Given Kenji’s own expertise and research interests, he focused particularly on the work of Filipino artist David Medalla.
Over the course of his Fellowship, Kenji became interested in the politics of identity in exhibitions, and particularly how Asian and African artists were exhibited together in the United Kingdom in the 1980s. He also led a wider conversation around spirituality in contemporary art collection and curating.
Alongside another of the 2018 Fellows, Nadine Siegert, Kenji contributed to a course, Towards Tomorrow’s Museum, run in partnership between Tate and King’s College London. The course, attended by 36 participants with 18 different nationalities represented, examined current priorities and new models for art museums. On the topic of ‘Decolonising the Museum’, Kenji explored how we think about engaging audiences, with a focus on the relationship between art and religion.
Paul Keeler, Sergio de Camargo, Guy Brett, Christopher Walker, David Medalla and Gustav Metzger mailing the Signals Newsbulletin (1946–66) from Cornwall Gardens in 1964. (Photo: Clay Perry.)
Further collaboration with Tate
2019
Common Exchange: Tate Exchange and MCA Chicago Commons
Common Exchange, convened at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) Chicago in July 2019, was the first meeting of an international network of museums concerned with the advancement of civic engagement and socially engaged art practice within their institutions.
The idea for the symposium was conceived by Kenji who, at the time, was the Marjorie Susman Curatorial Fellow at MCA Chicago, and subsequently developed in collaboration between Kenji, MCA Chicago and the Tate Exchange project.
Another Brooks Fellow, Daniela Ruiz Moreno (2019), was part of the symposium cohort, as its subject matter was directly related to her research into investigating potential models by which Tate Exchange could increase international collaboration. Daniela and her Host, Head of Tate Exchange Cara Courage, travelled to Chicago for the two-day symposium to share knowledge about programmes, operations, and projects.
Brooks Programme funding of this event therefore supported the ongoing career progression of two Brooks Fellows, as well as the development of Tate Exchange's international partnerships.
2019
Oxford Art Journal Essay Prize for Early Career Researchers
In 2019 Kenji’s essay ‘David Medalla: Dreams of Sculpture’, supported by the Fellowship, was awarded the Oxford Art Journal Essay Prize for Early Career Researchers. The essay was subsequently published in the Oxford Art Journal vol.43, no.3 (December 2020).
David Medalla
Sand Machine Bahag - Hari Trance #1 1963–2015
© David Medalla
Biography
Chanon Kenji Praepipatmongkol is Assistant Professor of Contemporary Art at McGill University, Montreal. His research revolves around the constitution of aesthetic form under conditions salient for the global majority, whether the precedence of religious forces in modernity, chronic illiberalism or non-temperate climactic ecologies.
Presently, he is working on two books, one on a transnational history of Buddhist modernism issuing from Thailand and another on the intertwined emergence of climate control, art conservation and conceptual art in the tropics. He is also currently part of a Getty Connecting Art Histories Project on the restitution of Southeast Asian art.