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[1]
Subject: Disruption and Progress: Reflecting on Digital Art Practice
From: Man Li

Organizers: Georgia Gerson (University of York), Man Li (University of York), Yuxuan Xiao (University of York)

I Deadline: 01. November 2024 I

Artists are often seen at the forefront of innovation in using emerging technologies as they seek to reflect on society and disrupt established norms, from the early experiments of Nam June Paik’s video art in the 1960s to the contemporary explorations of Lynn Hershman Leeson’s interactive installations. However, with the ubiquity of digital technologies, it is increasingly important to be aware of the contradiction between disruption and progress. This entails recognising that whilst new technologies initially promise innovation and progress, it is crucial to acknowledge the ‘bias of the machine’ (Steyerl and Vikram, 2023) and the ‘digital divide’ (Mukhopadhyay and Thompson, 2021) that have caused global disparities in digital production and access.

Therefore, this session invites researchers and artists to reconsider the tension between disruption and progress, exploring digital art’s relation to the dilemmas, stereotypes, and hierarchies accelerated by rapid technological development. This includes questioning social norms, traditional concepts, representations, and ways of seeing and thinking. We also welcome proposals that consider how art historians and artists throughout history have confronted these questions in connection to changing technologies of image-making and how these may inform and aid us in current debates.

This panel will feature 20-minute presentations, each followed by 5 minutes for questions. This will be an engaging session that brings together academics and practitioners, integrating both research by theory and practice. Alongside academic papers, we actively encourage proposals from artists for presenting practice-based research in various formats.

Please send proposals of no more than 250 words along with a brief CV to the session convenors:

Georgia Gerson, University of York, georgia.gersonyork.ac.uk
Man Li, University of York, ml2585york.ac.uk
Yuxuan Xiao, University of York, yuxuan.xiaoyork.ac.uk

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[2]
Subject: Presencing absence: The media afterlife of lost objects
From: Anna Calise

Convenors:
Camilla Balbi - Institute of Art History, Czech Academy of Sciences: balbiudu.cas.cz
Valentina Bartalesi – Affiliate Researcher, (Università della Svizzera italiana, Balerna): brtlsvalentinagmail.com
Anna Calise - IULM University, Milan: annacalise.ukgmail.com

I Deadline: 01. November 2024 I

The history of art, whether in antiquity or the present, is haunted by losses. The number of cultural and artistic artefacts that have not survived conflicts, environmental disasters and physiological decay is much greater than those still preserved today.
What sometimes persists, however, are a variety of media traces of these objects, presencing their identity through different forms. Not always considered art historical material – from casts to photographs, from tapestries to poetry, from virtual reality to AI – these recurrences carry analytical weight and raise important methodological and epistemological questions.
What role is played by ideological and critical stances in designing these new remediated replicas and memories? Which narratives do they support, and which do they conceal? How does the reception of these phantoms, crossing centuries, cultures and latitudes, change with reference to their public? Which are the most relevant methodological questions that emerge when engaging with these transient genealogies? Within this afterlife, which carries material, narrative, and critical traits, a new identity is forged for these items, which needs to be problematised by reflecting as well as on the – absent – presence of the mediated original.
This session welcomes contributions from transdisciplinary and transnational perspectives that address the recurrence of cultural objects, that have been lost and displaced, through alternative media forms. We look forward to the diverse perspectives contributing to our understanding of this important topic.

The session will compose of six to eight presentations, and welcomes both papers and other forms of discussion (such as 15/20-minute research paper with 10/5 minutes discussion; Pecha Kucha or Ignite talks; parings).