Tate Liverpool’s <i>Democracies</i> : curatorial methodologies for exploring democracy

This article reconstructs and juxtaposes two radically different methodologies for approaching the topic of democracy – one exemplified by major UK art gallery Tate Liverpool’s exhibition called Democracies (2020–2023), the second a set of approaches characteristic of work in the academic field of contemporary democratic theory. By comparing a range of key features of the two methodologies, the article draws out ways in which methodological insights from curation-as-research may usefully extend, deepen or challenge those characteristic of academic democratic theory.