Pooling voices sensitive to contemporary impasses, drawn from different fields, fronts, and backgrounds, the Seminars explore such themes as the invention of a new political imagination, the particularities of time that have emerged since the advent of virtual life, a de-colonial approach to current feminisms, and the reverberation of the symbolic production of indigenous peoples and social movements.
A central axis on which the Public Programs are plotted at the 21st Biennial, the meetings are designed to generate opportunities to produce previously unheard-of forms of thinking the future, both around and beyond the works on display, and with room for discussion and dissension.
The Seminars are held at the Theater (lower ground) and Auditorium (6th floor), in two stages, spanning three consecutive evenings apiece. The first takes place between October 15 and 17, and the second, November 12 and 15. In the interests of more thorough access, all sessions will have simultaneous translation in sign language.
The addresses prepared by the speakers were edited for publication under the title Leituras [Readings], which, along with the catalogue of works and artists, completes the 21st Biennial's editorial platform.
PETER PÁL PELBART — Professor of philosophy at the Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo. His published works include Ensaios do assombro (2019). He is the Portuguese translator of the oeuvre of Gilles Deleuze. Coeditor of n-1 edições publishing house and coordinator of the Ueinzz Theater Group, formed by psychiatric day patients from the A Casa hospital.
LISETTE LAGNADO — An independent critic and curator. She curated the 27th Bienal de São Paulo, Como viver junto (2006), and the 33rd Panorama of Brazilian Art, Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo (2013). She was director of the Escola de Artes Visuais do Parque Lage, Rio de Janeiro, between 2014 and 2017, and is a member of the curatorial team for the 11th Berlin Biennale (2020).
ANA PAULA COHEN — An independent curator and author. In addition to co-curating the 28th Bienal de São Paulo (2008), her most recent curatorial projects include exhibitions at the Tel Aviv Museum (Israel) and Banff Centre for the Arts (Canada). She is creator and coordinator of the graduate course in curatorial studies and practices administered at the Fundação Armando Alvares Penteado, in São Paulo.