Paz Ponce

Paz Ponce (b.1985, Cádiz, Spain) is an art historian and works in Berlin as an “interdependent” curator, cultural producer and consultant in arts communication. “Interdependent” means that her practice emerges and thrives by establishing connections with the many agents inside and outside of the arts supporting (trans)local ecologies for autonomous cultural production, solidifying friendships and creating lasting alliances rather than favoring one-off-projects

Methodologically her practice is articulated around the notion of post-studio: researching, learning from and developing models for contemporary artistic co-creation guided by the question/desire: how can the curatorial revert back to the local scene? This question, always formulated from a contingent and situated perspective, leads to action-responses that highlight the performativity of the curatorial, developing collaborative, processual, contextual, participatory formats designed from the point of view of their collective and community public reception. In this process she pays special attention towards the arch, towards the dramaturgy of programming: a course of events, a change of tempo, a change of intensity, a change of viewpoint. These questions led to collaborations with: NON Berlin, Galerie Wedding, Agora Collective e.V., ZK/U Berlin, 48 Stunden Neukölln, Uferstudios GmbH, Tanzfabrik, nGbK Berlin —in Berlin; Casa Tomada (São Paulo, BR), B_Tour (Tel Aviv, IR), Lumbardhi Cinema (Prizren, KV), Laboratorio Artístico de San Agustín–LASA & Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Wifredo Lam (Havana, CU), Esplanade–Theatres on the Bay (Singapore, SG), Academy of the Arts (Szczecin, PL), Οnassis AiR (Αthens, GR).

On a research level, stemming from a background in art history (Universidad Complutense, Madrid / Freie Universität, Berlín), she investigates the collective context in which art is produced and mediated, with a special focus on self-organization, cooperative historie(s), and biographical research. In this sense, she likes to contribute to the development of collective governance models inside self-organized spaces, cooperation networks, transforming institutions and speculative projects responding to the idea that “the process of imagining an institution is more interesting than becoming one”. In this cluster of interests she has worked as project coordinator at Agora Collective e.V. (2014-2019); she founded insurgencias.net: Berlin-based platform for socially conscious artistic practices & activistic positions from Latin America (s.2018); she works as dramaturge in Club Real’s participatory projects: “Organisms democracy / Jenseits Der Natur_ Republik der Lebewesen” (s.2017, ongoing; Viena, Berlin, Freiburg, Gelsenkirchen, Leipzig, Ostsee); she co-founded & curated “museo de la democracia” at nGbK (2021); she co-founded neue häute e.V. Künstler-Kurator*innen Kollektiv (s.2020) with the project space Ana Conda am Ufer (ACaU) inside Uferstudios in Berlin-Wedding; and she currently engages as consultant in the “Reimagining Onassis ΑiR” research group (2021/2023).

Paz Ponce is a participant of The School of Infinite Rehearsals of Οnassis AiR 2021-22 and of the Tailor-made Fellowships program 2022-23.