Why Curating Matters: Conversations on Art, Identity, and Everyday Life

Art is not only about what hangs on gallery walls. It is also about how we live, move, and make meaning in the everyday. This is where Curating Matters becomes an essential space for conversation. Founded by Yang Li and Jingwen Weng, Curating Matters explores the ways art, culture, and life intersect through exhibitions, publications, and a long-running podcast series. Based between London and China, the project connects global audiences through ideas that challenge traditional art-world boundaries while making artistic reflection accessible to all.

The Origins of Curating Matters

Curating Matters began as a podcast in July 2021, born out of a simple but profound curiosity: how can curating be more than just organizing exhibitions? For its founders, curating is a way of thinking, a method of reflecting on how people interact with art and each other. From its first recordings, the project approached art as a living conversation—one that unfolds in cafes, studios, and daily walks, as much as in museums.

The podcast quickly grew in popularity because of its conversational tone and cultural depth. Each episode reveals an honest learning process, not a polished monologue. The hosts speak as fellow travelers rather than authorities, using storytelling and dialogue to make complex art ideas feel relatable. This personal yet thoughtful style has become a defining feature of Curating Matters, resonating with a wide audience of artists, curators, and cultural thinkers.

Art as Everyday Practice

One of the central ideas behind Curating Matters is that art is not separate from life. The project’s first exhibition, Street on the Walk (2022), beautifully expressed this philosophy. The show featured six Asian artists whose works explored walking as both a physical and emotional act. Each piece invited viewers to think about motion, interaction, and awareness within the flow of daily life.

Rather than treating the exhibition as a static display, Curating Matters created a space for dialogue between people, objects, and environments. It emphasized the unseen gestures and moments that shape human experience. This approach reflected a key value of the platform: to challenge the boundaries between art-making and everyday living.

You can explore their evolving projects and exhibitions at https://curatingmatters.com/, where the team continues to document their creative journey.

Curating Identity in a Changing World

In today’s globalized art scene, questions of identity and cultural belonging are more complex than ever. Curating Matters addresses these topics with care and curiosity, often drawing on the founders’ own multicultural perspectives. With one foot in London’s diverse art community and another in China’s rapidly changing cultural landscape, the project reflects a constant negotiation between cultures, languages, and aesthetics.

Their second exhibition, Bon Voyage!, expanded on this exploration of identity and transition. Featuring nine artists and twenty-two multimedia works, it examined self-perception, uncertainty, and transformation in a world where change is constant. The exhibition highlighted how art can express the feeling of movement—not only physical but emotional and social.

Through exhibitions like Bon Voyage!, Curating Matters encourages viewers to think about how cultural experiences shape personal narratives. It reminds us that art is a mirror through which we see both our individuality and our shared humanity.

Beyond the Gallery: Rethinking the Role of Curating

Traditionally, curating has been confined to galleries and museums, where curators act as intermediaries between art and the public. Curating Matters redefines that role by taking curation into new spaces—podcasts, publications, and community-based platforms. This broader approach makes curating more participatory, turning it into an act of connection rather than control.

The founders believe that curating should not simply present finished works but should reveal the processes and thoughts behind them. Each project invites collaboration and open-ended interpretation. This philosophy has helped Curating Matters stand out as a creative movement rather than a conventional institution.

The publication Curating Matters, launched in 2022, extends this vision into print. It acts as both an archive and a conversation, combining visual documentation, essays, and experimental forms of writing. By publishing semi-annually, the team allows ideas to mature, encouraging slow thinking in an age of fast consumption. The publication not only records artistic activity but also questions how archiving itself can be an act of creativity.

Why the Conversations Matter

In a time dominated by digital overload and cultural fragmentation, the kind of reflective dialogue that Curating Matters offers feels essential. The podcast, available across multiple platforms, uses language that is accessible yet thoughtful. Listeners are invited to slow down and think deeply about art’s relevance to their own lives.

These conversations go beyond academic critique. They touch on emotions, personal experiences, and the subtle ways culture shapes human behavior. By treating art as a form of lived experience, Curating Matters reminds its audience that creativity is not exclusive to artists—it is a universal human impulse.

Through their episodes, Yang Li and Jingwen Weng show that talking about art is itself a creative act. Their discussions often wander between theory and personal reflection, allowing ideas to flow naturally. This conversational style makes their podcast an intimate space of learning, where mistakes and uncertainties become part of the process.

Building Cross-Cultural Bridges

At its core, Curating Matters is about connection. It links people from different cultural backgrounds through shared curiosity and dialogue. The founders’ experiences between East and West allow them to navigate contrasting perspectives with sensitivity and humor. Their work demonstrates how cross-cultural collaboration can lead to new ways of thinking about art and curating.

The website https://curatingmatters.com/ serves as an archive of this evolving collaboration. It gathers exhibitions, podcast episodes, and publications in one accessible space, making their ideas available to a global audience. The site also reflects their dedication to transparency, showing that the act of curating is not about perfection but about participation and ongoing growth.

Expanding the Meaning of Curating

What makes Curating Matters particularly relevant today is its refusal to define curating too narrowly. Instead, it treats curating as a living process—a practice that adapts, questions, and evolves with each project. Whether through a conversation, a walk, or a printed page, curating becomes a method of thinking about how people relate to art and each other.

This open-ended approach allows Curating Matters to move freely across formats. A podcast episode might inspire an exhibition, which then informs an article or publication. Each element feeds into the next, forming a continuous dialogue. The boundaries between creator, curator, and audience begin to blur, giving everyone a voice in shaping meaning.

By presenting curating as a shared experience, the project challenges traditional hierarchies in the art world. It invites the audience to be co-curators of thought and perception. This democratization of curating is part of what makes the platform so innovative and inspiring.

The Future of Curating Matters

As Curating Matters continues to evolve, its mission remains clear: to foster curiosity, inclusivity, and imagination in the way we think about art and culture. Future exhibitions and publications are likely to explore themes such as urban life, digital identity, and ecological awareness—all within the broader framework of artistic dialogue.

Their ongoing work highlights the importance of community and storytelling in curatorial practice. It suggests that the future of curating lies not in monumental exhibitions but in meaningful exchanges—those small, thoughtful moments when people come together to reflect, imagine, and create.

A Living Practice of Reflection

Curating Matters is more than a project; it is a mindset. It shows that curating is not confined to art institutions but can thrive in conversations, writings, and daily gestures. It celebrates the in-between spaces where creativity happens naturally—on the street, in conversation, and within the self.

Through its podcast, exhibitions, and publication, Curating Matters continues to expand our understanding of what it means to engage with art. It invites us to slow down, to notice, and to participate in the ongoing dialogue between identity, culture, and everyday life. In a world that moves too fast, it reminds us that curating truly matters—not just as a profession but as a way of living and seeing.