KoK’s semi-festo

We are three curators in conversation, forming an open collective that supports communication and collaboration within the curatorial field in Iceland. We come together because we feel that art critique in Iceland is limited, that the scene can feel gatekept, and that there is a need for a shared space where curators, artists, organisers, and others can talk openly about what is happening in the art field.

Our aim is to create a platform where we can discuss shared issues, think about access, review art, and reflect on how the field might grow in more open and connected ways. We also want to share interests, celebrate great things happening in the scene, and link local conversations to international contexts.

We came together out of a shared need to strengthen the connective tissue of our field, to voice concerns, and to imagine ways of working that feel more transparent, equitable, and responsive. Collaboration, for us, grows through generosity, accountability, and mutual respect.

For us, research and equality are closely connected; curiosity without care, or knowledge without context, can easily repeat old patterns. Thinking together becomes a method — a way to counter isolation, competition, and burnout.

We imagine a mobile, situational platform: one that moves across sites, contexts, and disciplines;

that listens, gathers, reviews art, and opens up conversations; that invites the wider art community to explore the state of the field and consider where access can be widened; that encourages discussion around structural issues and brings hidden problems to light; that may take the form of a conversation, a reading circle, a shared meal, a workshop, an exhibition, a walk.

We aim to create openings where gate-breaking becomes possible and where opinions can enter with less friction.

Our work moves toward a way of doing things where trust is built over time, where the process of working together matters, and where honesty can help guide our choices.

This collective is not fixed. It will shift and unfold through relationships, urgencies and shared acts.

It begins with the simple act of coming together, to ask, to listen, and to imagine otherwise.

– Becky, Helena and Tinna