University of Gothenburg
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Cathryn Klasto

Lecturer

The Crafts and Fine Art
Unit
Mail
cathryn.klasto@gu.se

About Cathryn Klasto

Hej! (* ^ ω ^)

///// I am* a transdisciplinary theoretician and artistic researcher

My theoretical work operates through writing and critical practice. While I do not produce art works, I engage in prototype making as a method of artistic research. While at times my work may appear like art work, it often possesses and alternative agenda and often does not subscribe to the expectations and identifications of a work of art.

╰(*´︶`*)╯♡

I operate in the realm of critical spatial practice and have a focus within that of interiors and processes of interiority. I am particularly interested in the spatial interior ethical relations produced by technological infrastructure and forms. While my research and teaching has previously engaged physical space and interiors, in the last year I have been moving away from the physical and into the digital. As a result I have begun working on my first monograph which critically investigates technological objects that have already, or are being predicted to, radically shape our interior lives. I am looking specifically at how the interior infrastructures and processes of the material objects consequently produce ethical experiences which challenge, disrupt, or reenforce the logics of reasoning and decision making which ultimately constitute the objects' interiors.

o(>ω<)o

To be transparent, I do not have a neatly packaged academic trajectory. I have a BA in Art and Architectural History from the University of Warwick (UK), an MA in Gender and Law from SOAS, University of London (UK) and a PhD in Architecture from the University of Sheffield (UK). My PhD research looked at the networked relationship between domestic interiors and urban socio-cultural, legal and economic exterior infrastructures in contemporary Tokyo. Wanting to challenge orientalist narratives produced by architectural discourse in Europe in relation to Japanese aesthetics and use of space, the research centered the lived interior experiences of fourth generation Japanese architects and residents. The Phd produced a 100,000 written thesis available open access, as well as a number of artistic prototypes.

(„• ᴗ •„)

In my role as a lecturer at HDK-Valand I am involved in various teaching and research activity.

In regard to teaching, I primarily teach on the MFA Fine Art programme which has a focus on the development of research skills, publicness and the role of art and the artist in society. I teach on both the practice and contextualisation courses, largely in relation to the theoretical framework of publicness, writing as a mode of research, methodological development and ethical engagement. I also currently run the freestanding course Introduction to Contemporary Art and Health which is taught entirely at distance. The course, as a transdisciplinary operation, aims to expand definitions and practices of both art and health, considering the cultural, social, political, technological, ecological relations that exist within the field.

Regarding research, I am currently co-editing an issue of Parse (Platform for Artistic Research) with Marie-Louise Richards (Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm) on Citations where we have spent the last two years cooperatively exploring the potentiality which exists if we move beyond institutional logics and power structures which dictate who we cite, how we cite, and why we cite. The issue will be launched in August 2023.

I am also involved in the research project The Fountain: An Art-Technological-Social Drama (2021-2024) ran by Dr. Maddie Leach and L'Internationale's Creative Europe project Museum of the Commons (2023-2026).

╰(*´︶`*)╯

My central areas of interest, from research, supervisory and pedagogical perspectives, are

(　･ω･)☞ ethics (meta-ethics, ethics as artistic production, ethics as space)

(　･ω･)☞ space (interiors, interiority, thresholds, enclaves, spatial justice, xeno-spatialities, atmospheres)

(　･ω･)☞ networks (technological infrastructures and processes, research organisation, logics, objects)

(　･ω･)☞ experimental methodologies (compositional, modular)

(⊃｡•́‿•̀｡)⊃

٩(◕‿◕)۶ *pronouns are she/they

(>ᴗ•) (psst: I am not loyal to discipline. I do not believe experts exist.)