| Abstract: | Reacting to the gradual neoliberalization of the European public art institutional landscape, actors within a number of critical art museums and galleries have attempted to reform their institutions from within through a process that is largely commensurate with Chantal Mouffe's radical political strategy of ‘critique as hegemonic engagement‐with’. This article focuses on Manuel J. Borja‐Villel's attempt to implement such a strategy at the Museu D'Art Contemporani, Barcelona (MACBA) in the early 2000s. Through an examination of two key projects – Las Agencias (The Agencies) (2001) and Com Volem ser Governats? (How do we want to be governed) (2003‐2004) – it considers the efficacy of such an approach. In so doing, it calls into question the public art institution's ability to perform a self‐critique when embedded within the hegemony of the neoliberal order and constrained by bureaucratic institutional limitations. It concludes by noting that Mouffe's strategy of engagement does not give sufficient consideration to the dependence critical public art institutions have on local and national political support and its funding channels, making them extremely susceptible to instrumentalization. In response to this constraint, it makes the recommendation that, rather than curbing their experimentation, these critical actors should embrace the potentially temporary status of their institutions, and intentionally push them to and even beyond their bureaucratic limitations. |
