Vulnerability of the Moving Body

28. Jänner 2026, 14.00 Uhr Kunstuniversität Linz, Domgasse 1, Audimax A

Die Abteilung Kunstgeschichte / Kunsttheorie lädt zum Gastvortrag im Rahmen der Gastprofessur von Attilia Fattori Franchini.

This lecture reflects on what it means to build a performance programme from the ground up within a contemporary art institution, especially at a moment when live work demands new forms of attention, care, and structural commitment. It outlines the strategies developed to carve out space and duration for performance within environments that often celebrate experimentation rhetorically while restricting it structurally.
Anchored in vulnerability as a guiding concept, the lecture examines the dynamics between artist, institution, and audience, considering how embracing the precarious, the embodied, and the time-based can challenge institutional habits and open pathways toward more responsive and imaginative cultural infrastructures.

Joel Valabrega is a curator based in Porto and Milan. In 2024, she curated the Luxembourg Pavilion at the 60th International Venice Biennale and the Present Future section of Artissima Art Fair (Nov 2024 and Nov 2025). From 2020 to 2024, she was Curator of Performance and Moving Image at Mudam—Museum of Modern Art, Luxembourg, and in 2025, she became Head of Programme / Curator at Galeria Municipal do Porto.

Recent projects include the performance festival Fogo Fátuo(2025), the experimental exhibition Workers in Song by Billy Bultheel & James Richards (2024), the performative group exhibition After Laughter Comes Tears (2023), and the performance festival The Illusion of the End (2022). From 2016 to 2022, Valabrega co-ran the project space MEGA in Milan and has held curatorial roles at institutions such as V-A-C Foundation in Moscow and Venice (2018–19) and Triennale Milano (2020).

She edited After Laughter Comes Tears (Lenz Press, 2023), Tarek Atoui: Waters’ Witness #02 (Mudam/Les presses du réel, 2022), and the artist book form is void void is color (2020), and contributes regularly to exhibition catalogues and magazines.