Visualizing Identity: Exploring Dimensions of the Self through Art
UGA Emerging Scholars Virtual Symposium--February 19th and 20th, 2021

Keynote Speaker: February 18th, 2021 at 5:30pm

Submissions Due: November 30th, 2020

The Association of Graduate Art Students (AGAS) at the University of Georgia, in partnership with the Georgia Museum of Art (GMOA), invites emerging scholars to submit proposals for papers that contribute to the discussion of identity in art. This symposium will reconsider representations of the self by addressing the multifaceted relationship between art and identity throughout the history of visual and material culture. Through depictions of race, class, and gender, images of the body can challenge previously established narratives, both individually and socially. Art, in all its permutations, complicates notions of the self, making this discussion relevant to the present moment when identities are under threat.
While we invite contributions of scholarship considering representations of identity in the modern era, papers that address ideas of race, class, and gender in earlier time periods, non-figural depictions, or non-Western traditions are equally welcome. Other relevant topics include but are not limited to:

- Representations of nationalism and colonialism
- Reconsiderations of the female artist
- Explorations of LGBTQ+ identities
- Examinations of socio-economic implications
- Reimaginings of the domestic sphere

This symposium will be held in conjunction with the exhibition Emma Amos: Color Odyssey, on view at the GMOA from January 30th, 2021 through April 25th, 2021. As an African-American, Atlanta-born artist, Amos was a distinguished painter and printmaker known for depicting representations of identity in her bold and colorful mixed-media paintings.

We invite current graduate students and other emerging scholars (within five years post-graduation) to submit abstracts (maximum 300 words) and an up-to-date CV to uga.symposiumgmail.com by November 30, 2020. Applicants will be notified of the committee’s decision by mid-January, and the symposium will be held virtually on February 19th and 20th, 2021. Even though travel is not a consideration, a modest honorarium will still be provided.