State (Re)construction and Art in Central and Eastern Europe 1918-2018 – international conference
State (Re)construction and Art in Central and Eastern Europe 1918–2018
November 19th–21st, 2018
The Concert Hall
State (Re)construction and Art in Central and Eastern Europe 1918–2018 conference aims to explore geo-cultural characteristics of the Continent’s eastern part. The participants intend to delve in particular in multi-level relations between political systems and the delicate matter of art that has often been used instrumentally by the state while at other times it has anticipated or constructed models of social self-identification. Discussion topics shall include the concepts of national art and idioms of pro-state artistic attitudes after 1918 as well as artistic activities that contest political regimes and systems at large. We shall look into the essence and role of identity models constructed in the cultural sphere against changing socio-political configurations. In East-Central Europe the period of political and economic transformation following the fall of Berlin Wall was marked by a drive for integration with the European Union on the one hand, and renewed interest in the paradigms of regional, national and local identity on the other. Various milieus throughout the region have embraced the idea of returning to the traditions lost or discarded in the times of nineteenth century imperialism, Cold War or as a result of contemporaneous globalisation. The conference shall also attempt to diagnose the processes of reinterpreting old and generating new narrations, national and local, in the context of transnationalism and evolving notions on state cultural policies in the interwar and Cold War times as well as over quarter of a century that has passed since the collapse of the Iron Curtain.
Thirty eight participants will be discussing the issues of the cultural identity of the East-Central European region in the course of three days, 19–21 November, 2018 in the Royal Castle in Warsaw.
Conference organisers: The Royal Castle in Warsaw, The Centre for Europe (Warsaw University), The Department of the History of Art and Culture (Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun).
Conference Committee: Prof. Irena Kossowska, Prof. Marcin Lachowski, Ph.D. Agnieszka Chmielewska