Abstract
(Dis)Place: New Directions in the History of Art in Israel
The conference aims to revisit basic questions about locality, identity and belonging in relation to the hierarchies of different narratives and the canon of art in Israel, as well as to introduce new questions about space, time and alterity. The conference will map critical strategies and discuss new frameworks for thinking of histories of art and political conditions in Israel while dismantling the borders of that field – imaginary and concrete, thus serving as a venue to contemplate identities of artists working in and outside the state of Israel in an age of globalization and trans-nationalism. Also, an intersectional approach that considers multiple and overlapping identity categories, such as religion and nationality, will serve to discuss different case studies.
Among the questions critical to the conference are: In what ways have migration and the plurality of cultures in Israel impacted artistic production? How can the developments of art's relation to nationalism in Israel be reconsidered in light of global art history? Has the canon of art in Israel undergone significant revision, and what are its dynamics of inclusion and exclusion? Thus, this conference aims to carve out new understandings of prevailing narratives while destabilizing established notions of self, state, and belonging.