ANTHROPOLOGY
Lidia's research focuses on contemporary art and visual culture. Within the field she has the following areas of concentration: (1) art institutions: international art biennials with an extensive study of the Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art; and the Humboldt Lab Dahlem, an initiative established to rethink exhibition models and public engagement for the Humboldt Forum in Berlin, Germany. (2) Complexities and outcomes of encounters between contemporary art and anthropology. (3) Use of media in contemporary art exhibitions and in historical collections museums.
As an independent project (dmovies.net), in 2007 Lidia began a research of contemporary art practices at international art biennials and has interviewed over 150 artists, curators and visual culture theorists. While her focus was initially on art production and curation, it organically expanded to include art institutions. This led into her studies of Visual Anthropology at Freie Iniversity Berlin with a focus on contemporary art biennials. She spent a year researching the 7th Berlin Biennale during 2011-2012. Lidia followed the process of conceptualizing and realizing the exhibition, specifically the linguistic articulation of ideas and their re-articulation in visual forms. In addition to a written thesis, the audio-visual material is reflected in a 60 min. film ‘ARTISTIC OFFICE: CONSTRUCTING THE 7TH BERLIN BIENNALE FOR CONTEMPORARY ART’ (2012).
During her studies, Lidia researched art practices in SECOND LIFE with the aim to explore the potential of a virtual space as a digital platform facilitating creative processes. Starting from the kind of art being made in SECOND LIFE, looking into indications of paradigm shifts in a broader context of contemporary art practice and the possibility to create new modes of viewer participation and experiences. The resulting paper, 'Art Production and its Conceptual Systems in Second Life' is published in VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS AND CULTURES. Urte Undine Frömming (ED.). 2013. PP. 233-245. FRANKFURT AM MAIN: PETER LANG VERLAG.
In her path Lidia encountered the Humboldt Lab Dahlem and her research progressed to inclusion of contemporary art in historical collections museums. Parallel to the above topics, as part of her exposure to exhibitions, Lidia has been analyzing and juxtaposing how the medium of film is used in contemporary art exhibition context and in ethnological museums. Several of Lidia's films have been part of museum and gallery exhibitions and she has presented papers at international conferences and seminars on topics of art biennials, contemporary art and anthropology, and encounters between contemporary art and museums with historical art collections. Lidia integrates her research of art practices and institutions in her lectures at Freie University in Berlin.