Session Proposal
The Rules of (Collective) Art: Social Engagement and Collaboration in Contemporary Art
Deadline: 09 November 2009.
The dramatic development of the field of socially engaged art over recent decades demands that new critical methods are developed to evaluate the status of art produced in this way. We are looking for papers which both reflect these changes and challenge current artistic practice and its theoretical basis.
This session will build a frame of reference around such artworks by calling for papers from art historians, art critics, theorists, artists and educationalists involved in this field. The session will seek to map out the shifting boundaries of classification and meaning which arise from contemporary art production in collaboration with communities.
We are interested in papers which make reference to new approaches to critical evaluation in this area that may be influenced by social geography, cultural sociology and social anthropology, as well as by contemporary developments in art theory. This can be an opportunity to reappraise the pedagogical basis of art school training and the implications of the economic and social realities of art based careers related to regeneration agendas.
At stake in socially engaged artistic processes is the “consecrated value” of the art object (modernist and postmodernist) and the definition of the authorship of contemporary artworks produced through community collaboration. The work of Pierre Bourdieu, for example, specifically his examination of 19th Century literary modernism in The Rules of Art, 1996 Les regles de l’art, 1992; Eng. Rules of Art: Genesis and Structure of the Literary Field, Stanford University Press, 1996, has led to challenges to traditional modernist notions of the work of art, its intention and its audience.
Ultimately these artworks and the processes out of which they are made require a reappraisal of the concepts and methods available to art historians in assessing their impact and artistic value. This session wil help further that investigation and we welcome all contributions.
Co-Chairs
Robin Baillie MA(Hons), HDip (Fine Art)
Senior Outreach Officer, The National Galleries of Scotland
Dr Ken Neil, MA(Hons), MFA, PhD
Head of Historical and Critical Studies, The Glasgow School of Art
Please send an abstract of your proposal, which should be 250 words describing a 30 minute paper to:
Robin Baillie
Senior Outreach Officer
National Galleries of Scotland
Baden Powell House
3 Victoria Terrace
Edinburgh EH1 2JL.
rbaillie@nationalgalleries.org<mailto:rbaillie@nationalgalleries.org
and
Ken Neil
Head of Historical and Critical Studies
The Glasgow School of Art
167 Renfrew Street
Glasgow G3 6RQ.
k.neil@gsa.ac.uk<mailto:k.neil@gsa.ac.uk
If you would like to offer a paper, please contact the session convenor(s) directly, providing an abstract of your proposed paper in no more than 250 words, your name and institutional affiliation (if any). Please do not send paper proposals to the conference convenor.
Robin Baillie
Senior Outreach Officer
Education Department
The National Galleries of Scotland
Scottish National Portrait Gallery
1 Queen Street
Edinburgh
EH2 1JD
rbaillie@nationalgalleries.org
0131 624 6430
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