Art & Violence Now

How does contemporary art address issues of violence? What role does violence play in mass popular culture? What forms does violence take today, and do we have an adequate critical vocabulary for theorising contemporary forms of violence? How does violence put pressure on models of visual experience, on forms of subjecthood, and collectivity? How do online and digital media frame violence, and are these media inherently more violent than other, older forms?
Perhaps the question this conference asks most deeply is, does violence itself have a history? And is the 'now' of art and violence today distinguishable from other moments through an examination of its representation in performance, traditional media, social media, and digital platforms?
Art & Violence Now is a one-day symposium exploring the intersection between contemporary art and violence, with contributions from an international panel of artists and researchers. Attendance is free but ticketed.
Programme
Panel I: AFFECT/TRAUMA
Bernadette Buckley, ‘No-one has been injured in the making of this work (perhaps): Revisiting the works of Burden, Clarke and Dickinson’
Jennifer Good, ‘The world strikes the body’
Kirsten Adkins, ‘Trauma and belonging: Conflicted representations of combat in army recruitment campaigns’
Ruth Bretherick,'Yoko Ono’s violent camera'
Panel II: THE STATE AND ITS MARGINS
Varunika Saraf, ‘Citizen Z: Art in the times of religious nationalism’
Ermelinda Xheza, ‘The politics of aesthetics and the question of violence in the work of Giannis Behrakis’
Leah McBride, 'Death embodied: Morgue as atelier in the work of Theresa Margolles'
Karolina Kolenda, ‘Dissonant landscapes: viewing sites of violence after 9/11’
Panel III: COMMUNITIES AND/OF DISSENT
Marilia Paes, ‘Art and conflict in Zrtur Zmijewski’s Them’
Lucy Weir, 'Shoot an Iraqi: Wafaa Bilal's platforms of dissent'
Ivan Knapp, 'Meme-work: Psychoanalysis and the alt-right’s unsafe spaces'
Tamara Trodd, 'Laughter and force in Amalia Ulman’s White Flag Emoji series'

Art & Violence Now
Hunter Lecture Theatre
Lecture Theatre O17 (Hunter Building)
Edinburgh College of Art
74 Lauriston Place