13502

Readings in Contemporary Art and Theory

Eric de Bruyn

Kommentar

This course is designed as a reading seminar. During each session we will discuss another, relatively recent and well-received publication in the field of contemporary art and theory (academic books, catalogs, etc.) The purpose of the seminar is to become acquainted with current debates in the field of art history and its methodological underpinnings as well to practice the writing of book reviews. At the outset of the seminar, we will collectively decide upon a list of books to read, which are not written for a strictly specialist audience. We will discuss the introduction and at least one chapter of each book and, if available, consult any available book reviews. Examples can range from the fields of museology and postcoloniality, such as François Vergès, A Programme of Absolute Disorder: Decolonizing the Museum (2024), to the ‘social turn’ in art, such as Jennifer Ponce de León, Another Aesthetics is Possible: Arts of Rebellion in the Fourth World War (2021), or social historical studies of post-45 art, such as Romy Golan, Flashback Empire: The Political Imaginary of Italian Art in the 1960s (2021) and Thomas Crow, The Artist in the Counter-Culture (2023). The seminar hours will be blocked – three hours per session every other week. Course languages: German and English. Schließen