ICP College Interview: Daria Tuminas

International Center of Photography: What’s a foundational textual content that formed how you consider pictures? 

Daria Tuminas: It is tough to single out one instance, as studying and being influenced by concepts is a cumulative course of: one textual content results in one other, and ideas evolve over time. During my MA program in Film and Photographic Studies (2010–2011), I used to be launched to many texts that collectively laid a basis for understanding the medium in all its complexity. 

Perhaps the ebook that has had probably the most lasting influence, and one I frequently return to, as its relevance and urgency solely develop with time, is The Civil Contract of Photography (Zone Books, 2008) by theorist and curator Ariella Azoulay. In this groundbreaking publication, Azoulay examines pictures as a device for shaping citizenship, political company, and resistance, notably in relation to questions of visibility and invisibility surrounding marginalized teams corresponding to Palestinians and girls. 

 

“..reading and being influenced by ideas is a cumulative process: one text leads to another, and thoughts evolve over time.”

 

ICP: Tell us a couple of picture present you’ve seen lately that shocked you indirectly? 

DT: The most up-to-date exhibition I visited was Prix de Rome Visual Arts 2025 on the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam. While not particularly targeted on pictures, I went to see the newly commissioned works by the 4 artists nominated for this 12 months’s modern artwork prize. I used to be particularly excited to see the set up by Kevin Osepa—an artist working throughout pictures, video, efficiency, and set up, whose observe engages with Afro-Caribbean spirituality, identification, colonial reminiscence, and queer views. 

 Lusgarda is a magical work in each sense of the phrase. It displays on Ocho Dia, the eight-day mourning interval following a funeral in Curaçao. Osepa guides guests via a hall crammed with objects which are directly on a regular basis objects and carriers of non secular which means and performance on the island, main right into a second area that includes a video work on collective mourning. Figures of mourners additionally inhabit this area, remodeling the museum’s galleries right into a locus of a near-spiritual expertise. 

I had the respect of interviewing the artist for the Prix de Rome catalogue and was accustomed to the method behind the making of the work. Despite this prior information, the set up was nonetheless a profound shock when it comes to its influence as soon as realized, and within the highly effective method Osepa layers meanings via the mixture of various media. I returned to see the set up twice and can go once more. 

 

ICP: Where do you discover inventive inspiration outdoors of the picture world? 

 DT: I discover inspiration primarily via studying, cinema, music, and attending occasions throughout the cultural discipline. I additionally worth lengthy walks and the act of slowing down, taking time to do nothing each time doable. 

To identify just some sources of inspiration: the newest ebook I completed was The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love by bell hooks. Next on my studying record is Hito Steyerl’s Medium Hot: Images within the Age of Heat. A ebook I return to usually is Jericho Brown’s poetry assortment: The Tradition.  

Cinema is one other main supply of inspiration. Some of my favourite movies embrace Atlantics by Mati Diop, Happy as Lazzaro by Alice Rohrwacher, Long Day’s Journey Into Night by Bi Gan, and Taming the Garden by Salomé Jashi. 

 

“..from ongoing genocides, ecocides, and wars to living amid the sixth mass extinction. It is then relevant to ask ourselves: what does it imply to work with photographic practices in the conditions of polycrisis?”

 

ICP: What areas or matters in pictures and curatorial concept or observe do you suppose are underexplored at this time, and what would you prefer to see extra of in upcoming cohorts? 

DT: I hope this system will encourage the cohort to discover potential fields of experimentation inside the curatorial area, each theoretically and virtually. I’ll spotlight simply two examples from upcoming programs in this system right here, although I imagine every course introduces views and methodologies that advantage additional consideration and analysis. 

Collaborative Approaches in Photography, led by Nkule Mabaso, director of Fotogalleriet in Oslo, curator, and artist, explores pictures as a co-creative course of. Students will “examine the evolution of photographic practice and exhibitions through the lens of shared authorship, networked production, and community-driven presentation.” Ideally, the course may even stimulate the collaborative spirit between college students that may emerge organically via its length. 

Another instance is Curating Otherwise: Feminist Frameworks for Thinking and Making by Taous R. Dahmani, curator at The Photographers’ Gallery in London. As Dahmani explains, the course “invites students to explore how feminist theory can reshape curatorial practice—how we think, how we collaborate, and how we care. Moving between key feminist texts from the 20th and 21st centuries and examples of curatorial projects, we will examine how questions of power, voice, labor, embodiment, and care intersect with exhibition-making.” As the results of the course, I hope college students will embrace feminist methods and use them to reimagine the position of the curator via a feminist lens. 

 

ICP: How do you foresee the position of pictures evolving in response to international challenges (local weather, identification, politics), and the way ought to rising photographers or curators put together? 

DT: Today we certainly expertise the world within the so-called permacrisis or polycrisis. Meaning that crises are cascading, collaging, piling up, and being interconnected: from ongoing genocides, ecocides, and wars to residing amid the sixth mass extinction. It is then related to ask ourselves: what does it suggest to work with photographic practices within the circumstances of polycrisis?  

I imagine it implies what Donna J. Haraway calls “staying with the trouble” in her ebook Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin within the Chthulucene (Duke University Press, 2016). Meaning studying to be current, residing in “response-ability on a damaged earth.” This response-ability is essential. It is a capability to reply. Ability to be accountable. And in circumstances of the polycrisis, it may be sustained solely via plural, “multiple—piled”, collaged, and interconnected acts of togetherness.  

 

“This response-ability is crucial. It is an ability to respond. Ability to be responsible. And in conditions of the polycrisis, it can be sustained only through something as plural and multiple—piled, collaged, interconnected acts of togetherness.”

There may be after all no final definition of what acts of togetherness and types of collaborations may very well be within the photographic discipline. These acts manifest themselves on many ranges. For instance, the engagement in creation of a picture: making collectively, co-authoring between artists and photographed individuals, artists and artists, communities, collectives, households, and more-than-human beings. Further, which means manufacturing with researchers, designers, writers, editors, curators, publishers, and establishments. Facilitating areas of collective information manufacturing with the audiences. And importantly: doing the collective work of reimagining all of those relations.