Dr Edgar Schmitz
Edgar is an artist and lecturer in critical studies at Goldsmiths, he has also written extensively on contemporary art.
Staff details
Edgar Schmitz is an artist who renders escapist backdrops from film, sculpture, animation and writing.
His work was part of A.C.A.D.E.M.Y (Vanabbemuseum 2006), No Soul for Sale (Tate Modern, 2010), British Art Show 7 (Hayward Touring, 2010/11) a.o., and has been presented in solo exhibitions at ICA, London (with Liam Gillick, 2006), FormContent (London, 2010), Cooper Gallery (Dundee, 2012) and Himalayas Art Museum (Shanghai, 2015).
Schmitz has also written extensively on contemporary art, with contributions to Kunstforum international, Texte zur Kunst and artforum as well as contemporary, tema celeste and numerous catalogue essays, including texts on Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Phil Collins, on Brian Jungen’s animalities, on humour in Deleuze and Slominski, and on Sarah Morris’LA.
His Hubs and Fictions book (with Sophia Hao) was published by Sternberg Press in 2016.
He is currently working on Alovestorysomewherearound2046 (with Pieternel Vermoortel), Choreographic (with Mårten Spångberg), Animate Assembly (with Verina Gfader and Esther Leslie) and Imminent Futures (with Sophia Hao).
He was Associate Researcher 2017 at netwerk center for contemporary art, Aalst (B), and is their Shadow Artist for 2017-19. Schmitz is a Reader in Art, Joint Head of Critical Studies BAFA, and a member of the Art Research PhD programme core team.
Publications and research outputs
Show/Exhibition
Schmitz, Edgar. 2017. CHOREOGRAPHIC 1-5. In: "CHOREOGRAPHIC 1-5", Research Pavilion, 57th Venice Biennale, Italy, 26-29 June 2017.
Schmitz, Edgar. 2015. Surplus Cameo Decor: sindanao 2. In: "Surplus Cameo Decor: sindanao 2", Shanghai Himalayas Museum, China, 28.6.-9.8.2015.
Schmitz, Edgar. 2012. Surplus Cameo Decor. In: "Surplus Cameo Decor", Cooper Gallery, Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design, Dundee, United Kingdom, 18 October - 14 December 2012.
Article
Schmitz, Edgar; Vemeir, Katleen and Heiremans, Ronny. 2016. Never Really in Real Time. PARSE Journal, 4, pp. 121-131. ISSN 2002-0511
Book
Schmitz, Edgar. 2025. Ambient attitudes. On contingency, treason and humour. Zürich/ Berlin: on_curating press.
Book Section
Schmitz, Edgar. 2010. Which Way to Heaven? In: Lisa Le Feuvre, ed. Failure. Whitechapel/ MIT. ISBN 978-0-262-51477-4
Schmitz, Edgar. 2010. Traps Against Capture. In: Simon D. O'Sullivan and Stephen Zepke, eds. Deleuze and Contemporary Art. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, pp. 208-224. ISBN 978-0748638383
Schmitz, Edgar. 2010. Some Turn and Some Don't (On Set-Ups). In: Paul o'Neill and Mick Wilson, eds. Curating and the Educational Turn. London/ Amsterdam: Open Editions/ de Appel. ISBN 978-0-949004-18-5
Edited Book
Hao, Sophia Yadong and Schmitz, Edgar, eds. 2016. Hubs and Fictions. On Current Art and Imported Remoteness. Berlin: Sternberg Press. ISBN 9783956790256
Thesis
Schmitz, Edgar. 2009. Ambient Attitudes. On practices of contingency, treason and humour.. Doctoral thesis, Goldsmiths, University of London