Am 9. und 10. Januar 2025 findet der interdisziplinäre Workshop „The Elusive Global: Potential Histories of Art and Media“ des GRK 2132 „Das Dokumentarische. Exzess und Entzug“ statt. Organisiert von Ying Sze Pek und Anne Hemkendreis, beginnt der Workshop am Donnerstag, den 9. Januar 2025, mit dem Abendvortrag „When words make worlds – a potential art history across and between languages“ von Prof. Dr. Monica Juneja. Am darauffolgenden Freitag, den 10. Januar 2025, werden die im Vortrag aufgekommenen Fragen im Austausch mit weiteren Expert:innen transkultureller und postkolonialer Forschung – Prof. Dr. Susanne Leeb, Dr. Sebastián Eduardo Dávila, Dr. Anja Sunhyun Michaelsen und Prof. Dr. Tahani Nadim – vertieft und um weiterführende Perspektiven bereichert. 

Vortrag:  Donnerstag, 9. Januar 2025 | 18-20 Uhr (c.t.) | Campus, HGA 30
Workshop: Freitag, 10. Januar 2025 | 9-17 Uhr (c.t.) | UNI 105, Raum EG 015

The Elusive “Global”: Potential Histories of Art and Media

In this workshop, we take stock of current postcolonial and decolonial approaches in modern/contemporary art history and visual studies, and in adjacent media studies discourses. We are interested to explore these methodologies—including the rubrics of transculturation and postmigration—from a situated perspective as researchers working in academia and art- and exhibition practice in Germany.

In our work on art, culture, and media, we operate today in an intellectual setting where calls to decolonialize and provincialize, to unlearn and relearn, are de rigueur. Looking to the field of art history and criticism in the 1990s and 2000s, where discourses have since evolved and terms shifted, we observe that much has been gained: no longer mainly interested in questions of globalization, we explore processes of transculturation; the centering of diversity and inclusion has made way for critical cosmopolitanism. Critical and self-critical perspectives in provenance research, exhibition practice, and in the organization of teaching and faculties at the university have been imperative.

Yet, calls for decolonization and emphases on inclusion are not always accompanied by critical change or political engagement. Misdirected, tokenistic gestures and the instrumentalization of minoritarian positions reflect the absence of attention to historical, structural, and invisible relations of power. Still we cannot accept that the histories marked by colonial violence we have received are irrevocable—we regard it as crucial to develop potential histories and practices from non-Eurocentric and socially just perspectives.

During the workshop, we consider what has been gained with the establishing of postcolonial approaches in art history and visual studies, and media cultural studies. To what extent “are” we “more” international, decolonial, and transcultural today? Have circumstances in fact fundamentally shifted in the academy and museum practice—with the possibilities of arts and cultural funding? And, finally: what roles, alongside art, can digitization play with regard to memory culture and colonial archives? Our workshop discusses these questions with a focus on developments in Germany, while also attending to international comparisons.

Programm

Donnerstag, 9.1.2024, Campus (HGA 30)
18-20h (c.t.): Keynote: Monica Juneja: „When words make worlds – a potential art history across and between languages“ (Moderation Annette Urban)

Freitag, 10.1.2024, Universitätsstraße 105 (EG 015)

9.15-10.30h: Ying Pek und Anne Hemkendreis: Willkommen und Einführung; Nachbesprechung des Vortrags und Besprechung mit Monica Juneja

10.30-10.45h: Kaffeepause

10.45-12.30h: „Leaving Art History? Contemporary Art and Material Practices“ - Susanne Leeb und Sebastián Eduardo Dávila

12.30-13.30: Mittagspause

13.30-15.00h: „Archive Interventions“ - Anja Sunhyun Michaelsen

15.00-15.15h: Kaffeepause

15.15-16.45h: „Activating archives: a postcolonial perspective on re-collection“ - Tahani Nadim

16.45-17.00h: Wrap-Up

Um Anmeldung für den Workshop wird gebeten bis zum Montag, den 6. Januar 2025, per Mail an:
das-dokumentarischeruhr-uni-bochum.de.

Nach Anmeldung wird vorbereitendes Lektürematerial versandt.