Vita
The Colombian-Swiss art historian, curator and author Mateo Chacón Pino has curated projects in art spaces, museums, galleries and farms in Switzerland, the Netherlands and Germany. He participated in The Curatorial and Artistic Thing at the sixtyeight art institute in Copenhagen and the Curatorial Program at De Appel, Amsterdam. Mateo Chacón Pino currently lives in Kassel and works as a Scientific Associate at the documenta Institute and at the University of Kassel in the Department of Art and Society, Prof. Dr. Liliana Gómez. In his dissertation The Distinction of Art & Nature, he questions historiographical dispositives of art history in the context of the exhibition and their aesthetic potential to synchronize human history and climate change. He completed his master's thesis in 2021 at the University of Zurich on the role of state art funding for the understanding of art using the case study of the SüdKulturFonds in Switzerland.
Research project
The Distinction of Art and Nature. Temporal Epistemologies of Art History in Exhibitions.
In recent decades, the ecological interest of art history has developed a well-founded understanding of the representation of ecological and environmental issues in works of art. Nevertheless, the question arises as to whether and how the concept of art constitutes the distinction between art and nature: Is eco-art part of the nature it speaks of? Based on an understanding of art as a configuration of human temporalities and exhibition as a condition of art, the dissertation project approaches this question as a double challenge: A history of science that addresses the question of how art historiographical dispositifs distinguish between art and nature and, on the other hand, which temporalities are applied in the exhibition of art. The project approaches the temporal potential of narrating art and climate change synchronously from several case studies from recent exhibition history, land art and current developments in food art.
This work will be written in English.
Main research areas
Temporality and globality of exhibitions
Aesthetic representation of ecological relationships
History of art history
Philosophy of history
History and art as epistemes of the environment
Exhibition Ecologies Working Group
Lectures (Selection)
2024 Art & Extractivism in the Atacama Desert, Contribution to “Gender, Climate Change & Rurality in Latinamerica and the Caribbean” Panel, Semana Latina Conference, CELA, Kassel, DE
2024 The Distinction of Art & Nature, project presentation Art & Society colloquium, Kassel, DE
2024 Lessons from Art Conservation for Rewilding Practices, Pitch, KuSoKo, Raamwerk, Kassel, DE
2024 Moving through “Critical Zones”, Contribution to “Beyond Exhibitions” Panel, CAA Annual Conference, Chicago, IL, USA
2023 Artist Talk with Regina de Miguel, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA, USA
2023 Work-in-Progress Presentation, Burg Giebichenstein Kunsthochschule Halle, Halle, DE
2023 The Climate of Art, Presentation, Food Culture Days, Vevey, CH
2023 Artist Talk with Cem A. (@freeze_magazine), Galeriefest/Grimmwelt Museum, Kassel, DE
2022 Artist Talk with Helin Alas, Berlin program for artists, Berlin, DE
2022 Panel Discussion, Tecnologiás en territorios: Artes mediales, ciencias y cambio climático, Practicas Curatoriales, Instituto de Estética, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago de Chile, CL
2021 Artist Talk with Marie van Berchem, Le Foyer/Grand Palais, Bern, CH
Academic conferences and workshops
2024 Earthly Matter(s) in the Exhibition Space. An Ecological Approach by Friederike Schäfer, traces Forschungsstation, Kassel, DE
2024 Coordinator & Lecturer International Summer University Kassel Inside Arts Seminar
2023 Coordinator, Lecturer & Committee Member, Summer School at Universidad del Rosario, Bogotá, Colombia, in collaboration with University of Kassel/documenta Institut
2023 Coordinator & Lecturer International Summer University Kassel, Inside Arts Seminar
2022 Coordinator, Lecturer & Committee Member, Summer School, University of Kassel/documenta Institut, in collaboration with Más Arte Más Accion (Lumbung members, documenta fifteen), Kassel, DE
2022 Coordinator & Lecturer International Summer University Kassel, Inside Arts Seminar
Exhibitions/curatorial work
2023 Teilchen/Examen/Gezeiten, Graduation Exhibition Kunsthochschule Kassel, documenta Halle, Kassel, DE
2023 Radical Symbiosis, CCA Radius, Delft, NL, with Àngels Miralda Tena
2020 ANÜMN, Outdoor Performance by Paula Baeza Pailamilla, Leimbachsteg, CH
2020 Caracas, at Second Nature Projects, L23, Zurich, CH, in collaboration with Ana Alenso
2019 Initiator & Curator, Plateaux Festival, Hof Blum, Samstagern, CH
2019 The Infinite Convergence, Anca Poterasu Gallery, Leipzig, DE
2017 Wofür es sich immer noch zu leben lohnt, Hyperlokal, Zurich, CH
2017 Graduation Exhibition MA Artistic Research, UvA/Rietveld Academy, Nieuw Dakota, Amsterdam, NL
2017 Why Is Everybody Being So Nice, De Appel & Stedelijk, Amsterdam, NL
2016 Curatorial Programme and Arianne Loze, in: You're Such A Curator!, Symposium, De Appel, Amsterdam, NL
2013 – 2014 Founder & Curator, Artspace Arbenz, Zurich, CH
Interview
03 | 2025: The Creative Climate Leadership Podcast
Publications (selection)
Chacón Pino, Mateo (2023) Editorial: The Climate of Art. In: Boca a Boca. (Cycle #3).
Chacón Pino, Mateo (2022): What is Yet to Come? Julian Charrière’s ‘Controlled Burn’. In: Berlin Art Link.
Chacón Pino, Mateo (2021): The Stretch of the Cultural Worker, Conversation with Lois Braganza, Arts of the Working Class. In: The Health Care Issue (18), p. 79–80.
Chacón Pino, Mateo (2021): On Photography beim VFO. In: Reading Rämistrasse (#58).
Chacón Pino, Mateo (2021): Kinke Kooi bei Galerie Bernhard. In: Reading Rämistrasse (#42).
Chacón Pino, Mateo (2021): Camp Fires at Last Tango, Tanzhaus Zürich & Shedhalle Zürich. In: Reading Rämistrasse (#65).
Chacón Pino, Mateo (2020): Cristian Fogarolli at Object A. In: Reading Rämistrasse (#25).
Chacón Pino, Mateo (2020): And Suddenly It All Blossomed, with Olamiju Fajemisin. In: PROVENCE (SS21), p. 306–311.