From decentring to crisis recentring: institutional authority in contested global art exhibitions

Imagine a world where the most important art shows on the planet are no longer run by a single, famous director picking the best paintings. Instead, these massive exhibitions are increasingly organized by groups of artists, community leaders, and researchers working together across different countries. They share money, space, and ideas, trying to move away from the old model where a few powerful institutions in Europe or North America decide what the world gets to see. This shift is meant to be fairer, giving a voice to people and places that have been left out for a long time. But a difficult question remains: when things go wrong, when a piece of art causes a huge political scandal or offends a community, who actually has the power to stop it, change it, or cancel it? Does the new, shared way of working survive the crisis, or does the old system of bosses and rules snap back into place?

A new study by researchers Yupeng Zheng and Liangyong Yan investigates exactly this moment of tension. They looked closely at three major international art events that recently faced intense controversy: the documenta fifteen exhibition in Germany, the 12th Berlin Biennale, and the planned South African Pavilion at the Venice Biennale. Each of these events had promised to share power, using methods like collective decision-making or independent committees to choose the art. Yet, in each case, a political dispute forced the organizers to make a hard choice. The researchers wanted to see who really held the reins when the pressure was on. They found that while these exhibitions successfully invited new voices to the table, the moment a crisis hit, the power to make final, binding decisions often returned to the traditional authorities—managers, government ministers, or expert panels—leaving the artists and community groups with a voice that could be heard but not necessarily acted upon.

The first case the researchers examined was documenta fifteen, held in Kassel, Germany. This show was famous for its "lumbung" concept, an Indonesian term for a communal rice barn, which meant that resources and decisions were shared among many collectives rather than controlled by one person. However, the exhibition faced a severe crisis when a large banner created by an Indonesian art collective called Taring Padi was found to contain imagery that many recognized as antisemitic. The banner depicted various political enemies, but two figures used symbols associated with Jewish people in a hateful way. The artists explained that their work was meant to fight against dictatorship and that they had not intended to be antisemitic, but the imagery was undeniable. The researchers noted that while the artists had a strong voice to explain their history and intentions, they did not have the power to stop the removal. The decision to cover and then take down the banner was made by the exhibition's management and a panel of experts appointed by the organization's shareholders. This led to the departure of the director and a major overhaul of how the institution reviews its work. The study suggests that while the artists were part of the process, the final authority to judge harm and enforce a decision remained with the traditional management structures.

In Berlin, the situation played out differently but revealed a similar pattern regarding who controls the display. The 12th Berlin Biennale focused on themes of repair and the lasting effects of colonialism. One installation featured enlarged photographs of torture taken at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. While the artist intended to expose the violence of the occupation, Iraqi artists participating in the same show felt deeply hurt. They argued that displaying these images of torture next to their own work, without asking them first, was a form of re-victimization. The researchers observed that the artists and a curator signed an open letter to protest the display. The exhibition organizers apologized and moved the photographs to a different location. However, the researchers pointed out that this change happened only after the exhibition had already opened and the images had already been seen. The power to decide the initial size, placement, and context of the images had rested with the curators, not the Iraqi participants. The protest managed to alter the outcome, but only after the decision had already been made and the harm potentially done. The study highlights that having a say after the fact is not the same as having a say in the moment the conditions are set.

The third case took place in South Africa, involving the country's official pavilion at the Venice Biennale. Unlike the other two, this project was selected by an independent committee of experts who chose an artist named Gabrielle Goliath. Her work, a musical installation about mourning, included a section dedicated to a Palestinian poet killed in an airstrike. The South African Minister of Sport, Arts and Culture, however, decided that this part of the work was too divisive and demanded its removal. When the artist refused, the government department terminated its contract with the organization managing the pavilion. The researchers found that the independent committee, which had done the hard work of selecting the art, had no power to stop the minister. The legal system also sided with the government, ruling that the artists could not force the state to keep the project. The result was that the official national pavilion at Venice stood empty. The art was eventually shown in a nearby church, organized independently, but it lost the status and protection of being the official national representation. Here, the power to authorize the project under the state's name rested entirely with the government, overriding the independent selection process.

The researchers call this phenomenon "crisis recentring." It describes what happens when a political storm hits an exhibition that was trying to share power. Before the storm, the power might be spread out among artists, communities, and committees. But the moment a difficult decision must be made—like removing a work, changing a display, or canceling a contract—the old hierarchies wake up. Legal, financial, and administrative authorities step in to take control. The study does not say that these institutions were wrong to act; in the case of antisemitism or national representation, the government and management have a duty to respond. Instead, the researchers argue that we need to look more closely at what happens to the "shared" power during these moments. They found that while the new, collaborative models are real and valuable, they are often fragile when tested by controversy. The ability to speak is not the same as the ability to decide.

Ultimately, the paper suggests that true decentralization is not just about who gets invited to the party, but about who holds the keys when the party gets messy. The researchers propose that for these global art events to be truly fair, the rules need to be clearer about how decisions are made before a crisis occurs. They argue that institutions should involve the people most affected by the art in the decision-making process from the very beginning, not just after a problem arises. If the power to make final, enforceable decisions always snaps back to the top managers or government officials when things go wrong, then the promise of a more democratic art world remains incomplete. The study concludes that we must test these new systems not by how well they work in good times, but by whether the shared authority they promise can survive the pressure of a real-world conflict.