Seminar with Manuel Borja-Villel: How to decolonise a museum: an attempt in Catalonia

The seminar is part of the project Samtidskonstens sporrar
Read more about the project here.

Today, institutions oscillate between being spaces of power—condemning to submission those they claim to protect—and becoming territories of interpellation that nurture alternative ways of acting and thinking, ultimately encouraging the infinite possibilities of imagining and materializing life.

The creation of a shared, alternative narrative is now more necessary than ever. It demands a practice that resists what has been imposed—one that also emerges from the voices of those groups and individuals who have long been denied speech. Only then can we see that the so-called universal language is not as universal as it claims. In doing so, we also transcend the limits imposed by disciplinary boundaries.

In this lecture Manuel Borja-Villel will share his experience as the director of several art museums, with a special focus on being the advisor on questions of decolonization at the department of culture of the Generalitat de Catalunya. As such he was serving as the director of the program Museum Habitable, which aimed at dealing with museums and colonial legacies.

Manuel Borja-Villel (Burriana, 1957) is an art historian and curator. He was Director at the Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid from 2008 to 2023. During his tenure he carried out a radical remodeling of the collection and created the Museo en Red, a network of organizations, collectives, and institutions that question the museum and expand its boundaries from beyond. Prior to this Borja-Villel was Director at MACBA in Barcelona (1998-2007) and at the Fundació Antoni Tàpies (1989-1998). As Director of these institutions, he developed an extensive body of work that has entailed a turning point in contemporary curatorial practice: resignifying narratives and exhibition devices and their role in the governance of the institution. Most recently he has been one of the curators at the 35th Sao Paulo Biennial.

Silvermuseet, Arjeplog
The Silver Museum in Arjeplog is a cultural treasure trove nestled in the Swedish Lapland mountains, preserving over 13,000 objects that trace 10,000 years of human activity.
It houses one of the world’s most significant collections of Sámi silver and is located in a former nomad school dating back to 1854. The museum also leads research initiatives on the Arctic cultural landscape and collaborates closely with Sámi communities.

In collaboration with Sweden’s Museums

Image 1: Fotografi av Paulo Nazareth av Palau Moja, före detta Palats tillhörande Antonio López.
Image 2: Manuel Borja-Villel på Kin museum för samtidskonst. Foto av Johan Ylitalo