Symposium Colonial Modern:Aesthetics of the Past,Rebellions for the Future

Colonial Modern: Aesthetics of the Past, Rebellions for the Future

At the occasion of the booklaunch of Colonial Modern: Aesthetics of the Past, Rebellions for the Future you are cordially invited to keynote lectures by two central contributors, the British art historians and post-colonial theorists Kobena Mercer and Mark Crinson. A panel and public discussion with local and international researchers on the question of the transcultural character of Modernism will round up this public event, that will take place in the course of the annual Academy s open days 2011.

13:30 Introduction by Marion von Osten

14.00 Kobena Mercer (London)
Reflections on Art after Globalisation
Discussant: Christian Kravagna

15.00 Mark Crinson (Manchester)
Architecture, Amnesia, Empire: The British Avantgarde, Colonialism and the Welfare State
Discussant: Marion von Osten

16.00 Coffee-break

16.30 The Transculturality of Modernism
Panel with Lukasz Stanek, researcher of the “South of East West” project at ETH, Zurich and Christina Linortner, researcher of the project “Model House- Mapping Transcultural Modernism” at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna funded by WWTF.
Discussants: Tom Avermaete and Serhat Karakayali

18.00 Drinks and Book launch

Colonial Modern: Aesthetics of the Past, Rebellions for the Future is based on the exhibition In the Desert of Modernity: Colonial Planning and After, presented at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin and Les Abattoirs de Casablanca. The publication focuses on the dual topics of the relationship between the post-war aesthetic regime of modernism and the project of modernisation in architecture and urban planning. It reflects contemporary research into architectural modernism and colonialism, and uses the thesis of “negotiated modernism” to initiate new debates on conceptions of modernism–and inevitably postmodernism–in an interdisciplinary context. Colonial Modern has been co-edited by the architect and historian Tom Avermaete (TU Delft), the sociologist Serhat Karakayali (University of Halle) and the artist, author and curator Marion von Osten (Academy of Fine Arts Vienna).

with contributions by Mogniss H Abdallah/Agence IM’media, Nezar AlSayyad, Kahina Amal Djiar, Kader Attia, Tom Avermaete, Madeleine Bernstorff, Mark Crinson, Hassan Darsi, Monique Eleb, Serhat Karakayali, Christian Kravagna, Brigitta Kuster, Labor k3000 Zürich, André Loeckx, Kobena Mercer, Valentin Mudimbe, Françoise Navez-Bouchanine, Alona Nitzan-Shiftan, Bernd M Scherer, Horia Serhane, Sven-Olov Wallenstein, Marion von Osten, Daniel Weiss.