The Cosmoscow Lecture Hall is a space for dialogue about the processes taking place within the cultural and artistic environment. It addresses pressing issues of contemporary art, its development, engagement with heritage, and the shaping of the current cultural agenda. The discussions bring together members of the art community: collectors, representatives of museums and cultural institutions, curators, artists, and art historians.

The theme of the Lecture Hall at the 14th edition of the fair will be contemporary art's engagement with traditional crafts and folk arts and crafts. In recent years, artists and curators have increasingly been working with old handcraft techniques and turning to collaborations with master craftspeople, exploring cultural memory, regional history, and connections with the past. As part of the program, participants will discuss the preservation and reinterpretation of tangible and intangible heritage, the interaction between artists and craftspeople, the development of the industry, and the potential of traditional practices in the field of collecting.

Special attention will be paid to craft as a form of reflection and artistic expression, and to how practices rooted in the past are today becoming tools for shaping new artistic statements, identities, and cultural meanings.

The curator of the Lecture Hall program is Marina Shultz, an art historian, curator, and head of the Department of Contemporary Art at the State Hermitage Museum.

Location: Timiryazev Centre, 2nd floor, Lecture Hall.

Decolonizing Craft: Local Contexts on the Global Art Scene

Schedule