Paradoxical political developments in the ‘Global North’ – in particular the commercial, capitalist and legal embrace of sexual, gender and racial minorities and the rise of far-right nationalism, with its attendant visible and violent classism, racism, xenophobia, homophobia, and sexism – ask for an urgent renegotiation of minoritarian politics of in_visibilities. Against this backdrop, the international and interdisciplinary conference Renegotiating Minoritarian In_Visibilities will investigate how minoritarian strategies in art and visual culture can undermine hegemonic regimes of representation and challenge the dominant patterns of visibility, assimilation and intelligibility. Considering close connections between academia, art critique/practice and activism, the societal relevance of the conference is grounded in its exploration of aesthetic strategies that counteract processes of discrimination and stereotyping due to gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, age and further categories of difference.

The three-day conference with its format variety (workshops, artist talk, lecture performance, keynote lecture, short panel presentations, etc.) will take place on November 12-14, 2019 at the International Graduate Centre for the Study of Culture (GCSC) and the Institute for Art Education at Justus-Liebig-University Giessen, Germany. In addition, a kick-off event in the form of a performative presentation including a film screening will be offered on November 11, 2019 in the Margarete-Bieber-Saal.

PROGRAMME

Monday, 11.11.2019

6:30-8:30 p.m.: Margarete-Bieber-Saal, Ludwigstrasse 34, Giessen
PRE-CONFERENCE EVENT
Chair: Greta Olson

Sarah Held (Vienna) & Sylvia Sadzinski (Berlin): Plonker – Porn – Protest. A Performative Presentation and Movie Screening

Tuesday, 12.11.2019

1:00-1:45 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
Welcome & Introduction to the 1st Conference Day

2:00-3:30 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
PANEL I: In_Visible Relations & Solidarities
Chair: Jana Tiborra

Regina Brückner (Berlin): (In)Visibilities of Racism and Neonazi Terrorism: the “National Socialist Underground” in Audiovisual Media

Sebastian Garbe (Giessen): In_Visible Solidarities – Negotiating Political and Social Coalitions across Differences

Clara-Sophie Höhn (Augsburg): Hidden Histories? White Southern Women and their “In_Visible” Involvement in the Civil Rights Movement

4.00-5:45 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
WORKSHOP I (closed event)
Chair: Katharina Wolf

Maicyra Leão e Silva (Sergipe) & Magdalena Kallenberger (Weimar): Maternal Fantasies – Collective Artistic Strategies of In_Visibility towards Political Agency

6:15-7:45 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
KEYNOTE LECTURE
Chair: Oliver Klaassen & Jana Tiborra

Johanna Schaffer (Kassel) & Isabel Paehr (Berlin): Ambivalences of Visibility (Revised)

20.15 p.m.: Dinner at DachCafé

Wednesday, 13.11.2019

9:00-9:15 a.m.: GCSC, R. 001
Welcome & Introduction to the 2nd Conference Day

9:15 a.m. –12:15 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
WORKSHOP II (closed event)
Chair: Taya Hanauer & Rebekka Marpert

Johanna Schaffer (Kassel) with İpek Burçak (Kassel), Isabel Paehr (Berlin), Nicole voec (Kassel), and Cilian Woywod (Kassel): A Set of Speculative Interventions in Virtual Space

(Lunchbreak & Change of Room)

2:00-3:15 p.m.: Institute for Art Education, PHIL II, H105 (Photo Studio)
ARTIST TALK
Welcome: Ansgar Schnurr | Chair: Jana Tiborra

SandraF (London/Vienna): Spectral Realities

(Break & Change of Room)

3:45-5:15 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
PANEL II: Critiquing Hegemonic In_Visibilities
Chair: Cathérine Ludwig-Ockenfels

Lisa Beckmann (Giessen): The Politics of Staring: Negotiating Disability and Visibility from the Freak Show to the Ugly Laws in the US

Sebastian Köthe (Berlin): Censorship and Politics of In_Visibility in the “Global War on Terror”. The Case of Abu Zubaydah.

Fadi Saleh (Göttingen): Queer/Humanitarian Visibility: The Emergence of the Figure of "the Suffering Syrian Gay Refugee”

5:15-6:15 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
Theme-Café

6:15-7:15 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
LECTURE PERFORMANCE
Chair: Danae Gallo González

Sophie Sexon (Glasgow): The In_Visibility of the Non-Binary Body in Drag Performance and Medieval Visual Art

Evening Reception (7.15-8.30 p.m., GCSC, Foyer & R. 001)

Thursday, 14.11.2019

9:00-9:15 a.m.: GCSC, R. 001
Welcome & Introduction to the 3rd Conference Day

9:15-10:15 a.m.: GCSC, R. 001
LECTURE
Chair: Cathérine Ludwig-Ockenfels

Jonathan D. Katz (Philadelphia): The Sexuality of the Hard-Edge: Abstraction, Phenomenology, and Post War American Art

10:30 a.m.-12:00 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
PANEL III: Queer-Feminist In_Visibilities
Chair: Oliver Klaassen

Sarah Held (Wien): Subversion & Intervention – Material Culture as a Strategy of Visualization of Sexual Violence and Feminines

Sylvia Sadzinski (Berlin): Queer Feminist Curating or How to Go Beyond Politics of Representation?

William J. Simmons (Los Angeles): Queer Materialisms and Imaginary Friends

12:30-1:30 p.m.: GCSC, R. 001
Concluding Debate & Official Farewell

The conference is organised by the Research Area Visual and Material Culture Studies (RA4) of the GCSC.

ORGANISATION: Oliver Klaassen (Queer Art Studies, PhD student at the GCSC; Lecturer at various German universities); Cathérine Ludwig-Ockenfels (Early Modern History, PhD student at the GCSC); Jana Tiborra (Art Pedagogy, Research Assistant at the Institute for Art Pedagogy, JLU; PhD student at the GCSC); Katharina Wolf (Contemporary History, PhD student and Research Assistant at the GCSC).

COOPERATION PARTNERS: Institut für Kunstpädagogik (IfK) / JLU Gießen; Sektion "Medien and Gender" des Zentrums für Medien und Interaktivität (ZMI) / JLU Gießen; Zentrale Frauen und Gleichtstellungsbeauftragte und Büro für Chancengleichheit / JLU Gießen Autonome AStA-Referate: Queer-Feministisches Frauenreferat und Bi*-Schwulen-Trans-Queer-Referat / JLU Gießen; Gießener Hochschulgesellschaft: Gesellschaft von Freunden und Förderern der Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen; Research Network in Queer Studies, Decolonial Feminisms and Cultural Transformation (QDFCT) / JLU Gießen; Büro für Frauen und Gleichberechtigung der Stadt Gießen; Aidshilfe Gießen e.V. im Hans Peter Hauschildhaus.

Registration Deadline: 1. Nov.
For questions & registration, please contact in-visibilitygcsc.uni-giessen.de