Art as Cultural Diplomacy: (Re)Constructing Notions of Eastern and Western Europe

Call for Papers for the Panel:
Art as Cultural Diplomacy: (Re)Constructing Notions of Eastern and Western Europe

(As part of the Third Euroacademia International Conference ?Re-Inventing Eastern Europe? to be held in Berlin, Germany, 28-29 March 2014)

Deadline for paper proposals: 25 February 2014

Panel Organizer: Cassandra Sciortino, University of California, Santa Barbara

Panel Description:


Art as Cultural Diplomacy: (Re)Constructing Notions of Eastern and Western Europe

The panel ?Art as cultural diplomacy? seeks papers that explore the function of art (in its broadest definition) as an instrument of cultural diplomacy by the state and, especially, by nongovernmental actors. The main theme of the session is the question of art and diplomacy in Europe before and after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Papers are welcome which explore issues related to the role of art, diplomacy and the politicization of the European Union and its candidate countries, as are those which consider how the arts have pursued or resisted East-West dichotomies and other narratives of alterity in Europe and worldwide.


The panel seeks to combine a wide range of interdisciplinary perspectives to explore how art--its various practices, history, and theory--are an important area of inquiry in the expanding field of cultural diplomacy.  Selected papers will be invited for publication in a book.  Some examples of topics include:
?       How can art serve as a neutral platform for exchange to promote dialogue and understanding between foreign states?

?       How can art, including organized festivals (i.e. film, art, music.), cultivate transnational identities that undermine dichotomies of East and West, and other narratives of alterity in Europe and beyond it?

?       The implications for art as an instrument of diplomacy in a postmodern age where geopolitics and power are increasingly mobilized by image based structures of persuasion

?       How has/can art facilitate cohesion between European Union member states and candidate states that effectively responds to the EU?s efforts to create ?unity in diversity.?

?       The politics of mapping Europe: mental and cartographic

?       Community based art as a social practice to engage issues of European identity

?       The difference between art as cultural diplomacy and propaganda

?       The digital revolution and the emergence of social media as platforms for art to communicate across social, cultural, and national boundaries?

?       Diplomacy in the history of art in Europe and Eastern Europe

?       Artists as diplomats

?       Art history as diplomacy--exhibitions, post-colonial criticism, global art history, and other revisions to the conventional boundaries of Europe and its history of art

?       The international activity of cultural institutes


If interested in participating, please send a maximum 300 words abstract together with the details of your affiliation until 25th of February 2014 simultaneously at cassandra.sciortino@berkeley.edu and [email protected]

For the complete details of the conference and on-line application please see:
http://euroacademia.eu/conference/third-reinventing-eastern-europe/