The lecture examines artworks by contemporary Kazakh artists who work with the material trappings of statehood, including flags and maps. Treating the structures of sovereignty themselves as material for artistic experimentation they examine the assumption that the nation is the only form of post-colonial liberation. In this way, they expose the contingent nature of political authority and imagine more inclusive forms of (post- national belonging.
Organised by Professor Klara Kemp-Welch, Professor of Modern and Contemporary Art History and Dr Maria Mileeva, Senior Lecturer in Modern and Contemporary Art
Speaker
Sven Spieker teaches at UC Santa Barbara. His research focuses on transnational modern and contemporary art with a focus on Eastern Europe and Central Asia; media history; and the historical avant-gardes. He’s also interested in aesthetics at the intersection of philosophy and critical theory. He has published on a range topics including the archive in art, art and/as knowledge production, and acousmatic sound. He is the founding editor ofandas well as a co-founder of theand the.
