*Hans Ulrich Obrist, photo by Elias Hassos.*

Hans Ulrich Obrist (b. 1968, Zürich, Switzerland) is Artistic Director of the Serpentine Galleries in London. Prior to this, he was the Curator of the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris. Since his first show ‘World Soup (The Kitchen Show)’ in 1991, he has curated more than 300 exhibitions.

Obrist has lectured internationally at academic and art institutions, and is a contributing editor to Artforum, AnOther Magazine, Cahiers D'Art, and 032C; he is a regular contributor to Mousse and Kaleidoscope and he writes columns for Das Magazin and Weltkunst. In 2011 he received the CCS Bard Award for Curatorial Excellence, and in 2015 he was awarded the International Folkwang Prize for his commitment to the arts.

His recent publications include Ways of Curating (2015), The Age of Earthquakes (2015), Lives of the Artists, Lives of Architects (2015), Mondialité (2017), Somewhere Totally Else (2018) and The Athens Dialogues (2018).

LUCIJA ŠUTEJ: I’d like to start by diving into your curatorial approach, deeply rooted in dialogue and conversation. Could you tell us about the figures who have most influenced your practice and how they shaped your methodology?

HANS ULRICH OBRIST: My influences come from different layers. The first layer was my early encounters with artists. Growing up in Switzerland, I had a seminal experience with Peter Fischli and David Weiss while they were working on their film The Way Things Go. As a 16- or 17-year-old, I would spend time in their studio.

And other formative encounters included artists like Gerhard Richter, and Maria Lassnig. What was interesting was that, being so young, the artists felt compelled to give me tasks. Alighiero Boetti, for example, encouraged me to ask artists about their unrealized projects. While Rosemarie Trockel pushed me to seek out pioneering female artists who hadn’t received the visibility they deserved - and it was great because I met incredible artists like Maria Lassnig. These early experiences were like my first school of curating.

The second layer came when I entered the curatorial profession and found mentors like Suzanne Pagé, the then director of the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, and Kasper König, the legendary German curator. From them, I essentially learned how to make books, organize large-scale exhibitions, and run a museum.

The final layer of influence came from outside the art world. Urbanist Yona Friedman taught me about self-organization in exhibitions. Édouard Glissant, introduced me to the idea of museums as archipelagos rather than continents. These influences shaped my collaborative and interdisciplinary approach.

LŠ: That’s fascinating. Did your family background play a role in your early interest in art?

HUO: Not directly. My father was an accountant, and my mother was a schoolteacher with a creative side. She became an artist at 80, which was inspiring. She was influenced by progressive educators like Ivan Illich, but ultimately she was more interested in literature than visual arts. So, art came to me through unconventional channels—posters, chocolate wrappers, and even graffiti. For example, Harald Naegeli, the “Sprayer of Zurich,” was a big influence. Seeing his graffiti as a kid made me realize that art shouldn’t be confined to museums—it should reach people where they are, especially those who might never visit a museum.

LŠ: And how did you meet all the formative artists at such an early age?

HUO: There was a publication called Art Diary by Flash Art, an Italian art yearbook with contact details for artists, galleries, and curators. I’d write postcards to artists, introducing myself as a 17-year-old student passionate about their work, and ask if I could visit. Many were open to it. I also traveled a lot by night train, carrying information like an “analog internet” before the digital age. This made me a sort of connector, sharing stories and sparking conversations. It was a chain reaction, really.

I met Gerhard Richter at an opening at the Kunsthalle Bern in 1985 and I introduced myself. He invited me to his studio in Cologne, and I took a night train to visit him. I believe that being young opened many doors—people were generous with their time and knowledge.

LŠ: Harald Szeemann, is and was a towering figure in curating. How did his work influence your methods?

HUO: Szeemann’s interdisciplinarity and utopian vision were inspiring. Shows like When Attitudes Become Form and Monte Verità were groundbreaking. He was a public figure, which helped legitimize curating as a profession. My parents thought “curator” meant “healer,” so Szeemann’s visibility helped explain my career choice. However, my approach diverged from his. He was seen as the sole author of his exhibitions, while I’ve always leaned toward collaboration. For example, Cities on the Move with Hou Hanru explored Asian urbanism, and Utopia Station with Molly Nesbit and Rirkrit Tiravanija examined utopian ideas. My work is more open-ended and inclusive.

LŠ: Speaking of collaborations - which curatorial duos or partnerships shaped your work?

HUO: I was never part of fixed duos, but I’ve always worked with changing constellations. Early in my career, Kasper König co-signed exhibitions with me, which was incredibly supportive. I’ve tried to pay that forward by involving younger curators in my projects. I’ve also collaborated across disciplines—with novelist Adam Thirlwell on literature, poet Lemn Sissay on art-poetry projects, and many others. My system is open and flexible, but I also maintain long-term relationships with collaborators.

LŠ: One of your first curatorial roles was as a “migratory curator” at the Musée d’Art Moderne- which sounds intriguing.

HUO: It was a unique position. (laughs) After traveling extensively and organizing my first exhibition in my kitchen (which had 29 visitors but became a rumor), I received a grant from the Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art. I moved to Jouy-en-Josas, near Paris, for three months and lived next to artists like Absalon, Huang Yong Ping, and Toni Grand.

Suzanne Pagé, the museum’s director, noticed my work and offered me a job researching artists connected to Giacometti. She was intrigued by my mobility and suggested my exhibitions could “migrate” within the museum. So, I became the migratory curator, organizing shows in unconventional spaces—lobbies, basements, even stairwells. For example, Koo Jeong A stamped the lobby, Gabriel Orozco worked on the facade, and Sarah Sze created fragile architectures under the stairs. It was playful and experimental, allowing me to grow as a curator

*Nanomuseum, photos by Rudi Molacek. Images courtesy of the curator.*

LŠ: An ongoing intervention that challenged traditional museum spaces.

HUO: Absolutely! Artists like Felix Gonzalez-Torres questioned what a museum could be and he transformed the office spaces with flowers, creating an atmosphere of warmth and positivity that radiated into the exhibitions. It was about rethinking the museum as a living, dynamic space.

LŠ: When you joined the Serpentine Galleries in 2006, you became deeply involved with the pavilions. How have they evolved, and what role do they play in supporting experimentation?

HUO: The pavilions began in 2000 with Zaha Hadid and Julia Peyton-Jones. When I joined, the first decade was about establishing the program and showcasing architects who had never built in the UK. This was important because London, despite being a global city, had a surprisingly insular architecture scene. Architects like SANAA, Frank Gehry, and Rem Koolhaas had built everywhere except the UK and so, the pavilions became a platform to change that. Over time, we also started supporting younger architects, which is very important. For example, Frida Escobedo, who designed the 2018 pavilion, went on to win major commissions, including the recent Metropolitan Museum of Art’s rooftop renovation. The pavilion is now a launchpad for emerging talent, making the architecture world more diverse and inclusive.

LŠ: How do you foster collaboration between artists and architects at the Serpentine?

HUO: The pavilion is primarily an architecture commission, but we also sometime involve artists. For example, Theaster Gates, who has a background in urban planning, and Olafur Eliasson, who works with architectural forms, have participated. We also host Park Nights, where artists, filmmakers, and performers take over the pavilion. It’s about creating a dialogue between art, architecture, and the public.

LŠ: Another layer and fascinating aspect of your work is a series of learning collaborations under the title of Marathons—12-hour interdisciplinary events. How did they start?

HUO: So, the marathons began in 2005 when I was invited to a theater festival. I’m not a playwright, but they liked my conversational approach and suggested staging it. The first marathon was a 24-hour portrait of Stuttgart. Later, with Rem Koolhaas, we did a 12-hour portrait of London, interviewing 72 people, from Doris Lessing to Zaha Hadid. It’s about creating junctions between fields—art, science, literature, and more—and bringing people together outside their usual circles.

LŠ: I wonder - from such inspiring exchanges, what questions stay with you from these marathons?

HUO: I realise there is the need for spaces where people can meet and connect. Cities often fail to provide this, and technology, while powerful, can trap people in filter bubbles. The Marathons are about breaking those bubbles and fostering unexpected conversations.

LŠ: What’s next for you? Any topics you’re excited to explore in the next edition of Marathons?

HUO: I’m very interested in the future of education—how we can create new interdisciplinary schools like Black Mountain College. It’s a topic I’d love to explore in a future Marathon or conference.

LŠ: The AI Marathon seems particularly relevant today - what were some of the key takeaways for you? Did and to what extent has its open questions shaped The Serpentine’s Arts Technologies department established in 2014? What was the impetus for creating this department? Were you influenced by events and festivals such as Cybernetic Serendipity (ICA, London); The Machine as Seen at the End of the Mechanical Age (MoMA), New Tendencies (by curators Matko Meštrović and Boris Kelemen) in its creation?

HUO: The AI Marathon was not just an event—it was a constellation of 100 question marks, many of which remain unresolved. These questions are still relevant today, and I’d like to revisit them here.

The creation of the Arts and Technology Department at the Serpentine emerged from a simple but urgent need: we kept encountering artists who wanted to work with new technologies, but neither we nor most museums had the in-house capacity to support them. This gap felt critical to address! Artists were—and are—exploring video games, digital commissions, and other tech-driven forms. The department was born from the dual aim of enabling these productions at the Serpentine Galleries while also contributing to the wider cultural sector. At its core, it was about serving artists and art itself.

This work connects to a deeper legacy. Back in the 1990s, I met Billy Klüver, who co-founded Experiments in Art and Technology (E.A.T.) in the 1960s. His vision felt newly urgent in our era of technological omnipresence—we needed a contemporary equivalent. I was inspired by exhibitions like Cybernetic Serendipity, but even more so by Roy Ascott’s pioneering work. Through Brian Eno and Ascott’s students, I came to understand his profound influence in the UK: his ideas about feedback loops, cybernetics, and the artwork as a living organism anticipated much of what we are exploring today. (For further context, I’d recommend my recent interview with Ascott in Artforum.)

*Zadie Xa, Guest, Ghost, Host: MACHINE! Marathon. Photograph © 2017 Manuella Barczewski.*

*Guest, Ghost, Host: MACHINE! Marathon. Photograph © 2017 Plastiques Photography*

LŠ: How has the department evolved over the past decade?

HUO: It began modestly-with digital commissions for our website, but soon expanded into full-scale exhibitions. Early milestones included Ian Cheng’s AI: More Than Human and Hito Steyerl’s Power Plants (AI Garden). The shift wasn’t just about technology entering gallery spaces—it reflected two broader transformations. First was that artists are moving beyond galleries. Many now seek to embed their work directly into society. Think of Barbara Kruger’s public project at Tottenham Court Road, which reached entirely new audiences. These projects redefine scale and accessibility!

Hito Steyerl Power Plants Installation view, 11 April – 6 May 2019, Serpentine Galleries Design by Ayham Ghraowi, Developed by Ivaylo Getov Courtesy of the Artist, Andrew Kreps Gallery (New York) and Esther Schipper Gallery (Berlin) Photograph: © 2019 *readsreads.info*

The second shift is about embracing long-duration practices. As Roman Krznaric has noted, artists are resisting short-termism and event culture. Instead, they’re drawn to gardens, parks, and farms—projects that unfold over time. Alexander Daisy Ginsberg’s Pollinator Pathmaker (an AI-assisted garden) is a testament to this shift, where the artwork becomes a living system, evolving beyond the confines of an exhibition.

What’s most striking is how these changes reflect a broader rethinking of art’s role. Technology isn’t just a tool; it’s a bridge to new forms of participation and duration. Artists aren’t just making objects—they’re cultivating ecosystems, both digital and physical.

LŠ: How do you see the integration of technology within the museum environment - and how will museums be transformed? In your opinion what/or are the limits of digital innovation in curating?

HUO: The future is mixed reality. Take Jakob Kudsk Steensen's augmented reality pavilion as an example—it existed alongside our physical pavilion, never replacing it, but adding rich new layers of experience. This duality is crucial. It's not either or. In exhibitions like Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster: Alienarium 5, you encounter a physical memory archive, but through AR, you can zoom into details or even travel through time—like journeying through the history of a kitchen sink.

This isn't about choosing between analog or digital; the future of museums lies in this hybrid space. The limits, of course, that it replaces the experience and resonance of experiencing an exhibition with other people. This coming together builds community, and creates gathering. We must ensure technology enhances rather than replaces the core museum experience— of being present with art and other people. We need these museum spaces for encounters.

Then, consider our video game installations. My son, Gabriel, would have a lot of people come to play video games. However, some of his friends would watch others play the game, sparking conversations. It creates a multi-sensory environment. We need a clear reason for being in a museum—why come here instead of your living room? Each exhibition must answer this. Our participatory, performative video game projects do exactly that.

The real danger isn't technology itself, but homogenization—losing tactile, physical experiences to globalization's flattening effect. Mixed reality should make experiences more extraordinary and complex, never less tangible.

HANS ULRICH OBRIST

SURSUMA

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