  http://www.republicart.net/disc/institution/sheikh01_en.htm When thinking about art production and representation, it is therefore crucial to negotiate these terms both individually and in relation to each other.
And just as contemporary art practices have shown that neither the work nor the spectator can be formally defined and fixed, we have in recent years come to realize that the conception of a public sphere, the arena in which one meet and engage, is likewise dematerialised and/or expanded. We no longer conceive of the public sphere as an entity, as one location and/or formation as suggested in Habermas' famous description of the bourgeois public sphere.
Instead, we have to think of the public sphere as fragmented, as consisting of a number of spaces and/or formations that sometimes connect, sometimes close off, and that are in conflictual and contradictory relations to each other. And we have, through the efforts of Oskar Negt and Alexander Kluge, come to realise that our interactions as subjects with the public spheres are dependent on experiences. There not only exists public spheres (and ideals here-of), but also counter-publics. 
