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HOW TO STRATEGIZE?
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- Strategizing is an original approach to developing an artistic career, developed by Karolina Peskisheva as part of her academic research and grounded in methodology.
Karolina’s research addresses a fundamental question: how can you make art your profession? How can you design and develop your practice consistently — without compromising your own well-being and without exhausting yourself in the endless pursuit of trends?
For those who want to dive deeper into the subject and explore the theoretical foundations of strategizing, we have
For those who simply want to understand what strategizing is and why you need it, here is how it works.
Methodology is the study of methods — logos + method. At its core, it means putting the specific content of an activity aside and looking instead at the functions of the people and elements involved in it.
Take craft, for example. If you practice a craft, then within that particular activity you function as a craftsperson. Of course, you may simultaneously be a dreamer, a traveler, a wonderful parent, or the best dog owner in the world. But when you are practicing your craft, your identity as a craftsperson comes to the foreground.
Here, we understand identities as practical functions — as roles you take on in particular circumstances.
Take craft, for example. If you practice a craft, then within that particular activity you function as a craftsperson. Of course, you may simultaneously be a dreamer, a traveler, a wonderful parent, or the best dog owner in the world. But when you are practicing your craft, your identity as a craftsperson comes to the foreground.
Here, we understand identities as practical functions — as roles you take on in particular circumstances.
So how can this logic be applied to contemporary art?
After all, a single artistic act can bring together several identities. You can be an artist and, at the same time, an emigrant; you can make work about the experience of migration. So how can we talk about a single function in this situation?
After all, a single artistic act can bring together several identities. You can be an artist and, at the same time, an emigrant; you can make work about the experience of migration. So how can we talk about a single function in this situation?
there is no single definition of art as either a product or a form of human activity. Art depends on the situation. This means that you define the conditions of your own activity, effectively reinventing it as you go. Art is, quite literally, the opposite of a ready-made bicycle. And that is a large part of what makes it so compelling.
Consider the canonical New York conceptualists, such as Joseph Kosuth. They place the idea at the center of the artistic act, while aesthetic qualities are secondary. Contemporary conceptual artists such as Jenny Holzer, however, do not reject aesthetics. In their work, the sensory experience of the viewer can be just as important as the ideas being communicated.
Or take the Guerilla Girls. Their activist practice deliberately downplays individual authorship: anyone could be behind the gorilla mask, because the statement matters more than the identity of its author.
For artists such as Cecilia Vicuña, the situation is almost the opposite. Personal biography and identity are deeply woven into the artistic statement. For some artists, the author is dead; for others, the figure of the author — with their personal history and mythology — remains essential to understanding the work.
For artists such as Cecilia Vicuña, the situation is almost the opposite. Personal biography and identity are deeply woven into the artistic statement. For some artists, the author is dead; for others, the figure of the author — with their personal history and mythology — remains essential to understanding the work.
In other words, there are different systems for defining what art is.
For some, art is a way of exposing social injustice using methods that are almost journalistic. For others, it is an object of aesthetic inquiry. For some, art is spectacle; for others, it is research.
For some, art is a way of exposing social injustice using methods that are almost journalistic. For others, it is an object of aesthetic inquiry. For some, art is spectacle; for others, it is research.
There is no single "art".
By constructing their own definition of art — contradictory, consistent, confusing, incomplete, or otherwise — an artist creates a system of activity.
The artist invents their own bicycle.
And, ultimately, they are the one who knows how it works — and how to make it work for the viewer.
The artist invents their own bicycle.
And, ultimately, they are the one who knows how it works — and how to make it work for the viewer.
The key is to look not at what you work with, but at how you work with it.
Look at your method.
Your method includes your authorial position, your theoretical background, the way you identify a subject of inquiry, your particular tone and sensibility, and, ultimately, the art forms and techniques you choose to work with.
This is what we examine in detail in our mentoring programs.
With the help of experienced methodologists, you begin to identify the characteristics, techniques, and methods that are already present in your practice — including things you may not yet have consciously recognized as part of your method.
Look at your method.
Your method includes your authorial position, your theoretical background, the way you identify a subject of inquiry, your particular tone and sensibility, and, ultimately, the art forms and techniques you choose to work with.
This is what we examine in detail in our mentoring programs.
With the help of experienced methodologists, you begin to identify the characteristics, techniques, and methods that are already present in your practice — including things you may not yet have consciously recognized as part of your method.
So how do you identify and construct your own definition of art?
Fortunately, there is a straightforward answer:
First things first:
what is methodology?
what is methodology?
Xenon for the Peggy Guggenheim by Jenny Holzer
2003 Courtesy Peggy Guggenheim Collection
2003 Courtesy Peggy Guggenheim Collection
Joseph Kosuth. Self-defined object, 1966
Yellow neon mounted directly on the wall / 11 x 173 cm / 4 3/8 x 68 1/8 inches
© Joseph Kosuth / ARS, New York, 2015 Courtesy Sprüth Magers.
Yellow neon mounted directly on the wall / 11 x 173 cm / 4 3/8 x 68 1/8 inches
© Joseph Kosuth / ARS, New York, 2015 Courtesy Sprüth Magers.
Laugh, Cry, Fight! With The Guerrilla Girls Feminist Artists
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Laugh, Cry, Fight! … With The Guerrilla Girls
Do Women Have To Be Naked To Get Into the Met. Museum?, 1989
Courtesy of Guerrilla Girls
01 / 14
Laugh, Cry, Fight! … With The Guerrilla Girls
Do Women Have To Be Naked To Get Into the Met. Museum?, 1989
Courtesy of Guerrilla Girls
Cecilia Vicuña, Quipu Gut, 2017, site-specific installation, documenta 14, Kassel. Image Courtesy the artist.Daniela Aravena
This is where the most interesting part begins.
We start looking at your practice as an activity — one with its own methodological structure.
Every activity has an initial material, a product, a set of tools, and a goal.
The goal is the most important of these. That is why goal-setting is one of the key stages of our work with mentors.
We make your goals specific and test them against reality, so that they become both understandable and achievable. Then we break the first stages down into concrete tasks.
The principle is simple: if you want to accomplish something big, break it down into many smaller things you can actually do.
Once you can clearly see your method and your major goals, you can begin moving toward them deliberately.
But artistic practice is unpredictable. Circumstances change. Plans fail. Motivation fluctuates.
We start looking at your practice as an activity — one with its own methodological structure.
Every activity has an initial material, a product, a set of tools, and a goal.
The goal is the most important of these. That is why goal-setting is one of the key stages of our work with mentors.
We make your goals specific and test them against reality, so that they become both understandable and achievable. Then we break the first stages down into concrete tasks.
The principle is simple: if you want to accomplish something big, break it down into many smaller things you can actually do.
Once you can clearly see your method and your major goals, you can begin moving toward them deliberately.
But artistic practice is unpredictable. Circumstances change. Plans fail. Motivation fluctuates.
So how do you make sure that unpredictability does not destroy your method — and that you can rebuild your plans whenever necessary without losing sight of what matters?
This is where strategy comes in.
This is where strategy comes in.
Strategy is, in a sense, a way of building flexibility into your plans — whether they are ambitious or deliberately modest — and into your authorial method itself.
We have spent so much time talking about activity and systems because this is precisely the material strategizing works with. Without a methodological framework, there is nothing to strategize.
So what does strategizing actually involve?
We look at your practice as a system made up of multiple activity cycles, each directed toward a particular goal. It might be producing a series of paintings, rebuilding your portfolio, preparing for an exhibition, or developing a new research project.
But we do not isolate these individual tasks from the rest of your practice. We look at the whole system — including your relationships with galleries, your search for relevant open calls, and the other activities that support or compete with your artistic work.
We have spent so much time talking about activity and systems because this is precisely the material strategizing works with. Without a methodological framework, there is nothing to strategize.
So what does strategizing actually involve?
We look at your practice as a system made up of multiple activity cycles, each directed toward a particular goal. It might be producing a series of paintings, rebuilding your portfolio, preparing for an exhibition, or developing a new research project.
But we do not isolate these individual tasks from the rest of your practice. We look at the whole system — including your relationships with galleries, your search for relevant open calls, and the other activities that support or compete with your artistic work.
Together we eastablish priorities - helping you understand what matters to your art.
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Rethink "productivity": is it actually needed or whether it might be more useful to slow down and protect your own resources and your precious capacity for inspiration.
Build safety nets: to support your practice when things go wrong – for example, when you lose motivation or your personal vision.
Examine institutional pathways and consider how well they correspond to your values, your goals, and your authorial method.
Prepare for problems before they happen:
we identify potential obstacles on the way toward your goals and develop alternative routes, so that when a critical moment comes, you already have another option.
we identify potential obstacles on the way toward your goals and develop alternative routes, so that when a critical moment comes, you already have another option.
Ultimately, strategizing is about acquiring the basic tools of a methodologist yourself — rather than simply relying on the conclusions or advice of specially trained professionals.
The goal is not to give you a strategy that someone else has designed for you.
The goal is to give you a toolkit you can use yourself.
So that, eventually, we can let you navigate your own course — with a method you understand, goals you have chosen, and tools that allow you to adapt when circumstances change.
The goal is not to give you a strategy that someone else has designed for you.
The goal is to give you a toolkit you can use yourself.
So that, eventually, we can let you navigate your own course — with a method you understand, goals you have chosen, and tools that allow you to adapt when circumstances change.
So: you have identified your authorial method. You now have your own answer to the question: "what is art?"
