Signe Meisner Christensen

Research profile

My primary field of research is radical forms of organization in the contemporay art field. At the moment I am conducting the research project "Inventing New Strategies for Art Institutions", which is an investigation of non-sovereign infrastructures in self-organised art projects. Here I expore the politics of art programmes which develop locally engaged practices in a hybrid field between art, radical pedagogy and activism. The thesis of the project is that such locally embedded projects invent social ontologies of care - for constructing relations between people and institutions in non-govermental ways.  

The project "The Museum is Open" is a practice based curatorial project, collaborating with Kunsten, Museum of Modern Art in Aalborg.  It will run 2018-21. 

Research profile

Technology and Art

I have conducted research on early video art - looking at the coming together of activist, political action and the use of video as a new artistic media in the late 1970s. 

I am presently conducting research on the relation between technology and the totalisation of work in contemporary society. The context of this research is the exhibition project at Kunsten Work it Out which will take place in 2021.

Research profile

At Kunsten I conduct the research project The Museum is Open which is a new platform for collaboration, performative research and knowledge production in the museum. The Museum is Open is an experimental format. It interweaves with ongoing exhibitions and events at the museum, but at the same time it instantiates a series of collaborations and investigations with local groups around issues relating to the local context of Aalborg. Its first iteration which starts primo 2020 revolves around the issue of the good city and the function of art within structures of urban restructurings. The aim of the project is to gain new knowledge of how new modes of collective, process-driven knowledge production can become integrated within the institutional structures of the museum. The Museum is Open is a three year research  project funded by New Carlsberg Foundation. 

Research profile

A key focus in my research is developing criteria and strategies for practice-based research in educational settings as well as in cultural institutions. I am practicing this in the field of design and architecture, through the teaching of architectural BA students, as well as in the field of artisti research as supervisor and teacher at Art and Technology. At Kunsten I am developing a model of practice-based reseach that positions the museum strongly as a collaborator for the university as well as connets it to contemporary artistic practice.   

Teaching profile

I have been teaching as external lecurer at Art History, Aarhus University in courses on contemporary art and curatorial practice. 

Teaching profile

I am presently teaching at Urban Design and Architecture, AAU, in courses on Designing Public Spaces. Here I have a focus on methodology fostering in students analysical and creative skills to engage with specific urban spaces. The focus is on urban sites as complex material, social and performative arenas for formation of publics.

Teaching profile

I have been teaching BA students at Art and Technology as a lecturer in the course The History of Art and Technology as well as suppervised groups in their artistic projects. I have a focus on fostering skills in students to master creative processes and to integrate various forms of experiments and research into their artistic practice.