about

I am a Cypriot|German-Hungarian art curator, researcher, advisor and writer whose interests are grounded in curious, joyful and conscious experimentation with ideas, actions and projects through ecopedagogical, site-responsive, collective and collaborative configurations. My practice includes exhibition curating, (un) doing research, cultivating community-centred and socio-ecologically engaged art projects and public programming, designing and organising workshops and learning environments, and advising artists and institutions. I also write about ecology, culture, architecture, and systems rooted in making things with/for multispecies communities.

Since 2024, I have lived in a small village in the mountains of Pafos in Cyprus, bridging my interests and capacities with site-specific and land-based needs. I am learning how to forage, collect rainwater, and grow food. 

studies 

My first degree was in History of Art from the University of Glasgow (2011-2015). Following several years of experience in various positions in the arts sector, in private and not-for-profit spaces, self-run and collective projects, I decided to ground my curatorial practice in political ecology, decolonial/posthumanist critical pedagogies, and socially-engaged artistic practices that work towards a just, socio-ecological transition. In 2021, I began an MA in Education for Sustainable Development at the University of Gothenburg and a post-masters at the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm, titled Collective Practices II: Symbiotic Organisations.

(re)search 

At the intersection of these two programs I initiated a research project titled Systems, Pedagogies and Practices for Learning on a Damaged Planet, generously supported by the Kone Foundation. This practice-based research inquires into the ethical, onto-epistemological and practical aspects of cultivating and promoting an ecopedagogical praxis within and through collective artistic practices. At the same time, it inquires the limitations and possibilities of higher education and art institutional frameworks in implementing and permanently hosting ecopedagogical approaches, projects and programming. The research project unfolds in Cyprus, Italy, Sweden and Finland, while also being inspired by several collective efforts elsewhere.


 

︎ Learning in Becoming

︎  are.na 

︎  denise.araouzou@gmail.com 

  Blue Sky