Hélia Marçal

Culture, Identities, and Power
Contact:
heliamarcal@fcsh.unl.pt
Biography
Hélia Marçal is Lecturer in Art, Materials, and Technology at University College London‘s Department of History of Art and an integrated researcher at the Institute of Contemporary History (NOVA University Lisbon).
She worked as a Fellow in Contemporary Art Conservation and Research of the Andrew W. Mellon funded research project “Reshaping the Collectible: When Artworks Live in the Museum” at Tate (2018-2020) and as a Science Manager at the Institute of Contemporary History, NOVA University Lisbon (2017-2018). Cumulatively to these positions she has been the Coordinator of the Working Group on Theory, History, and Ethics of Conservation of the International Council of Museums Committee for Conservation since 2016.
Her current research interests are positioned within feminist new materialisms, material histories of activist artworks, ethics and performativity of cultural heritage, the conservation of time-based media and performance art, and both the materiality of contemporary art and the ways it is positioned and negotiated by museum, heritage, and conservation practices. Drawing on feminist epistemological lenses, she often explores issues of performativity, participation, partiality, and positionality in both her research and teaching. Her recent book project looks at current forms of activist performance to interrogate the wider politics of conservation of cultural heritage in the public sphere.
Research fields
- Materiality in the conservation of time-based media and performance art
- Feminist new materialisms
- Ethics and performativity of cultural heritage
- Notions of periphery/decentring, inclusions/exclusions, in material art histories and conservation
Selected publications
- Marçal, Hélia. “Becoming Difference: On the Ethics of Conserving the In-Between,” Studies in Conservation (2021). [PDF]
- Madeira, Cláudia, Fernando Matos Oliveira & Hélia Marçal (Coords.). Práticas de Arquivo em Artes Performativas. Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2020. [PDF]
- Marçal, Hélia. “Contemporary Art Conservation.” published as part of the research project Reshaping the Collectible: When Artworks Live in the Museum, Tate, 2019, https://www.tate.org.uk/research/reshaping-the-collectible/research-approach-conservation.
- Marçal, Hélia Pereira. “Conservation in an era of participation,” Journal of the Institute of Conservation 40 (2017): 97-104. [PDF]*
* Taylor & Francis and ICON Award for Outstanding Contribution (2017)
Main projects
- Individual project “Memory ecologies of performance art: between memory, performance, and political activism (1965-1981)” — Hosted by the IHC and funded by the Foundation for Science and Technology (2020.04286.CEECIND). 2021-2027
- Team member in the project “Documentation and Conservation of Performance” — Coordinated by Louise Lawson and funded by Tate. 2018-2020 [link]
- Fellow in Contemporary Art Conservation and Research in the project “Reshaping the Collectible: When Artworks Live in the Museum” — Coordinated by Pip Laurenson (Tate) and funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. 2018-2020 [link]
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Events
fevereiro, 2023
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Detalhes do Evento
The book authored by Erica Borg and Amedeo Policante will be presented in the scope of the Marxist Education Project by Ariel Salleh and Stuart Newman. Mutant Ecologies
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Detalhes do Evento
The book authored by Erica Borg and Amedeo Policante will be presented in the scope of the Marxist Education Project by Ariel Salleh and Stuart Newman.
Mutant Ecologies
Manufacturing Life in the Age of Genomic Capital
The interconnected fields of genomic science, genome editing, and biotechnology have emerged over the past half-century as a revolution in the production of new life forms that have been eagerly adopted by agriculture, pharmaceuticals, textiles, and other business sectors. While many – including the Nobel Committee – have heralded this as a “new epoch” of limitless possibilities for positive transformation, In Mutant Ecologies: Manufacturing Life in the Age of Genomic Capital, Erica Borg and Amedeo Policante show how genetic science has been deeply intertwined from its beginning with the raw imperatives of capital accumulation. “Genomic capital,” the authors’ term for the use of genetic materials in industrial production, has literally altered many of life’s metabolic processes in service to capital’s demands. Within a socio-historical context defined by the iron rules of competition and exploitation, capital no longer contents itself with simply appropriating the living bodies of plants and animals but purposefully designs their internal metabolism, and in that way it redesigns the countless living vectors that constitute the global biosphere. This biological revolution will ripple through the everyday lives of people everywhere. Erica and Amedeo will present Mutant Ecologies and Ariel Salleh and Stuart Newman will discuss the book and initiate the conversation.
🔗 More info and registration for the event
Tempo
(Sábado) 9:00 pm - 10:30 pm
Localização
Link to be provided to registered participants
Zoom
Organizador
Marxist Education Projectinfo@marxedproject.org 388 Atlantic Avenue, 2nd Floor Brooklyn, NY 11217 (USA)
News
IHC opens exhibition at the Assembly of the Republic
Feb 3, 2023
The exhibition Portuguese Forced Labourers in the III Reich arrives, enriched, at the Portuguese Parliament.
Victor Pereira receives Aristides de Sousa Mendes Award
Dec 8, 2022
Victor Pereira was one of the winners of the 2022 edition of the Aristides de Sousa Mendes Award.
IHC Contributes to the Memory of Portuguese Diplomacy
Dec 5, 2022
The website of the project Oral Memory of Portuguese Diplomacy has been published.
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