Maumaus, an Autobiography of an Institution

Through the lens of the history of Maumaus School of Visual Arts, an art institution in Lisbon dedicated to education, curation and production, my aim is to come to a greater understanding of how art and arts education – with their inherent critiques – have shifted over the last 25 years. My research aims to explore to what extent the history of Maumaus can be considered to mirror developments in the wider art world from the 1990s onwards. The project considers whether Maumaus has been able to provide an alternative to an increasingly accelerated world of “cultural industries” or might paradoxically be understood as an institution that has enabled the system it opposes. I take into account the specific socioeconomic and political circumstances under which Maumaus has been able to flourish, and what such circumstances – encountered and recognised or consciously created – have both enabled and disabled in turns. The PhD is based on the development of a reflexive analytical approach with the aim to come to an in-depth understanding of today’s phenomena within what seems to be an increasingly professional art world that function under dictates of performance indicators and productivity, based on instrumentalised modes of enquiry and experimentation.