Workshop: Feminist Object(ive)s: Writing Feminist Art Histories

University of York, 21st May 2013, 12.00 – 7.00pm

This event, hosted by the Centre for Modern Studies at the University of York, will explore the aims, challenges and complications of writing art histories from a feminist standpoint, considering feminist methodologies, encounters with feminist art and culture, and working with women artists, as well as more broadly politically engaged art practices. Six scholars will reflect on their experiences of engaging with and constructing feminist art histories, before a roundtable involving all participants at the end of the afternoon.

Confirmed speakers: Henrietta Stanford (Courtauld Institute of Art), Hilary Robinson (Middlesex University), James Boaden (York), Sylvie Simonds (McGill), Catherine Grant (Goldsmiths), Harriet Riches (Kingston)

In order to provide a series of jumping-off points for group discussion, participants are invited to provide a slide with an image or object relating to their own work. Location: The Tree House, Berrick Saul Building. Admission: Please contact Amy (at548@york.ac.uk) for further details and to register.

Exhibition: The Independent Group at the ICA

Nigel Henderson, Shattered Glass, 1961

Until 9th June 2013, Institute of Contemporary Art, London

To coincide with the 60th anniversary of the ground-breaking exhibition Parallel of Life & Art, this display presents original art works by the Independent Group in the Fox Reading Room.

The Independent Group met at the original ICA in Dover Street from 1952-5 and comprised architects Alison and Peter Smithson, James Stirling and Colin St John Wilson; artists Magda Cordell, Richard Hamilton, Nigel Henderson, John McHale, Eduardo Paolozzi and William Turnbull; music producer Frank Cordell and writers Lawrence Alloway, Reyner Banham and Toni del Renzio. Celebrated today as the so-called Fathers of Pop, the Group worked with art, science, technology and popular culture. From horror films to theories of evolution, modern architecture to Marilyn Monroe, this group project worked beyond traditional boundaries and conventional disciplinary areas.

Exhibition: R. B. Kitaj – Obsessions

Until 16th June 2013, Pallant House Gallery, Chichester

This exhibition at Pallant House Gallery, subtitled ‘Analyst for Our Time’, will feature over 70 major paintings, sketches and prints presenting an overview of all periods of Kitaj’s extensive oeuvre from the 1960s to his death in 2007. It will consider Kitaj’s early presentations of a fragmented world, reflecting his interest in art history and intellectuals such as ‘Aby Warburg’, and his paintings and collages addressing issues of European politics, philosophy and literature such as ‘The Murder of Rosa Luxembourg’ and ‘The Rise of Fascism’. It will also include Kitaj’s remarkable portraits of personal friends and figures he admired such as his portrait of David Hockney, ‘The Neo-Cubist’, and fictional characters from literature such as ‘The Arabist’ His fascination with the relationship between the body, sexuality and history is presented in a series of powerful paintings of bathers including ‘Self-Portrait as a Woman’ and ‘The Sensualist’.

Conference: The End of an Era? New Perspectives on Edwardian Art

Friday, May 10, 2013, 5:30 pm–7:30 pm, and Saturday, May 11, 2013, 9:30 am–5:45 pm
, Yale Centre for British Art, New Haven

Keynote Lecture: The Rhythm of Time in the Arts of Edwardian Britain, Angus Trumble, Senior Curator of Paintings and Sculpture, Yale Center for British Art

This international symposium coincides with the Center’s major exhibition Edwardian Opulence: British Art at the Dawn of the Twentieth Century, curated by Angus Trumble, Senior Curator of Paintings and Sculpture, Yale Center for British Art, and Andrea Wolk Rager, Visiting Assistant Professor, Case Western Reserve University. Although King Edward VII reigned for only nine years, he gave his name to an era remarkable for its opulence and its contradictions. This symposium will offer a forum for considering the state of the field of interdisciplinary studies of the Edwardian period. Presenting a series of position papers in response to key themes, speakers will examine why the Edwardian era continues to exert a powerful afterlife and provide new interpretations of the art of the period. Participants will also have the opportunity to tour the exhibition with the curators. Speakers include: Cassandra Albinson (Yale Center for British Art), Tim Barringer (Yale University), Grace Brockington (University of Bristol), Michael Hatt (University of Warwick), Linda Ferber (New-York Historical Society), Pamela Fletcher (Bowdoin College), Barbara Gallati (Independent Curator), Morna O’Neill (Wake Forest University), Susan Sidlauskas (Rutgers University), Sarah Turner (University of York), and Alison Inglis (University of Melbourne).

The symposium is free and open to the public. Advance registration is recommended. Register online through May 8. On-site registration will begin at 9:00 am on May 11. For further information, please contact Research (ycba.research@yale.edu).

 

Tate Britain: Looking at the View

Until 2 June 2013

This thematic display looks at continuities in the way artists have framed our vision of the landscape over the last 300 years. Coinciding with the re-opening of all Tate Britain’s galleries, the selection finds surprising coincidences and remarkable affinities in the way we look at the view, whether near or afar, high or low, from inside or out. Over seventy works by more than fifty artists are included, including familiar names such as J.M.W. Turner and Tracey Emin as well as lesser-known figures of British art history. The exhibition consists entirely of works from the Tate collection and is part of the BP British Art Displays.

Conference: Visual Culture in Crisis – Britain c.1800 – Present

Friday 10th – Saturday 11th May 2013, Bowland Auditorium, Berrick Saul Building, University of York.

Keynote Speakers: Professor Christopher Pinney (UCL), Dr Eric Stryker (Southern Methodist University), Dr. Chad Elias (University of York), and Corinne Silver (artist).

‘European mastery is always in crisis – and it is this same crisis that defines European modernity’ – Empire, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri

The word ‘crisis’ is frequently invoked to assess Britain’s current place in the world: crises in finance, journalism, politics and geopolitics dominate the media, all of which see the term used both to reflect, and manipulate, a sense of uncertainty and confusion on personal, national, and global levels. Taking its cue from Hardt and Negri’s location of ‘crisis’ as central to European modernity, this conference seeks to explore how visual cultures from the 19th century to the present have simultaneously responded to – and emerged from – such successive crises. Crisis might signify avant-garde break-through and embrace of modernity. It might impel artistic breakdown or flight from modernity, anarchic celebration, or resistance in the form of protest. Crisis in visual culture could above all be emblematic of the contingent nature of personal and political identities. As both a product and a precipitant of the inter-state and inter-subjective networks that have emerged in conjunction with imperialism and economic globalisation, crisis can articulate a disharmony between metropole and colony, centre and periphery, state and individual, working constantly to disrupt the geographical, cultural and class boundaries of peoples and nations.

This two-day conference, generously supported the British Art Research School at the University of York and the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, aims to begin unpacking some of these issues.  See below for a full timetable of the event, or visit our website for more information: http://visualcultureincrisis.wordpress.com/

All welcome – there is no fee.  Please register by emailing visualcultureincrisis@gmail.com

Conference – Victor Pasmore, Richard Hamilton: radical innovation in art, architecture and art education in the North East

Live Theatre, Newcastle – 3 & 4 May, 2013

This high-profile conference takes place at the Live Theatre, Newcastle, across one and a half days. It is open to all. Michael Bracewell, the author of Re-Make, Re-Model and the Birth of Roxy Music will be interviewing Marcus Price, former owner of Newcastle’s high-class mode outfitters. Among the various topics to be discussed will be the teaching of Basic Design, Hamilton’s interest in TV, politics and advertising, his collaboration with Duchamp, and his and Pasmore’s innovative exhibition-making. There will also be a paper on Pasmore’s involvement with the building of Peterlee new town and its Apollo Pavilion, and a look at Hamilton’s late engagement with digital technology through the lens of his Basic Design pedagogy. Overall the conference will explain why Newcastle University’s School of Art occupied a leading position amongst art schools in Britain in the 1950s and 1960s. Cumulatively, we will be investigating a rare moment in the history of art and design in this country, when a regional development made a vital contribution to the history of modernism. For further information on this conference and access to its

Call for Papers – Modern British History since 1750

Conference on Modern British History: Society, Culture, Politics and Religion since 1750. University of Edinburgh, 10-11 June 2013. Proposals due by 6 May 2013

Following the success of the conferences held at Strathclyde (2007-2009), at St Andrews in 2010, at Dundee in 2011, and at Stirling in 2012, the Modern British History Network will host a seventh major Conference on Modern British History at New College, University of Edinburgh, on 10-11 June 2013. The event is particularly aimed at members of the Scottish universities and the northern English universities although all historians are very welcome. Previous conferences have attracted delegates from across the UK and from overseas. Proposals for papers or registration to attend the event are now invited from researchers working on all aspects of modern British history. The conference aims to represent work covering the whole period since the late eighteenth century with topics in social, cultural, political and religious history. Proposals should be submitted by 6 May 2013 to Dr Juliette Pattinson (juliette.pattinson@strath.ac.uk). Over two days there will be three main papers from senior academics and short papers by other academics and postgraduates, who are equally welcome to speak.

Call for Papers – Legacy: Mythology and Authenticity in the Humanities

De Montfort University: A postgraduate conference 28th June 2013. Proposal Deadline April 16th

This conference focuses on the influence of cultural ‘legacies’ within current humanities research.  By highlighting the work of postgraduates and early career researchers, this interdisciplinary conference will examine the various ways in which ‘legacies’ are created, restructured, perpetuated and even rejected.  It will also question whether newer disciplines respond to cultural mythologies by establishing their own ‘legacy’ as a means of achieving academic authentication. The recent confirmed identity of Richard the III, Faber’s choice of cover illustration for its anniversary issue of Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, and the recent film adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit are just a few of the numerous examples that demonstrate how cultural legacies evolve within academic research and the public forum. These inherited cultural legacies are continually being redefined, rebranded and reevaluated, creating a cyclical pattern that challenges the ways in which we approach and define them.  This brings into question the social and political significance of ‘legacy’ and its relevance within the humanities, both as a research theme and as a lens by which to view the progression of our respective disciplines. The conference will conclude with a roundtable discussion with Professor Dominic Shellard the Vice-Chancellor of De Montfort University, Dr Will Buckingham of the School of Humanities at De Montfort University, and Mr Sam Causer of the Leicester School of Architecture.

Call for Papers – Identity Construction and Meaning

AAH Call for Papers for Student Summer Symposium 2013, University of Oxford, 20-21 June 2013. Proposals deadline, 1st April.

The concept of ‘identity’ is prolific within the visual arts and in many ways its pertaining issues have shaped the discipline of art history. The biographical approach to reading artists’ work privileged by Vasari in his Lives (1550) has had a lasting influence. The portrait remains an effective medium through which to narrate the historical and contemporary identity of particular institutions and nations, and the art market continues to rely upon authentic attribution. Yet this art history of names remains problematic and by no means comprehensively represents either the discipline of art history or the plural notions of identity that have come to influence it.

During the twentieth century, subjectivity was critiqued and revised: psychoanalysis destabilized the concept of a consistent and whole subject, positioning the self as an illusion of stability and a site of fragmentation; Barthes and Foucault challenged notions of authorship, arguing instead that the reader-viewer be considered in the creation and interpretation of a work. More recently, gender and postcolonial theory has cast light on notions of identity understood as performance and as Otherness, and new technologies, such as the Internet, have altered relations between international communities and provided new platforms for constructing identity.