Numerous researchers in various academic disciplines, including art history, history, anthropology, sociology and education, have for decades explored and attempted to define in greater detail both the synchronic and diachronic relationships and mutual influences between state bodies and art production, communication, education and reception. is conference aims to provide insight into the current field of knowledge about and interpretations of these relations from the 18th century to the present day – in other words, beginning from the period in which European states went through intense centralization, leading to the growth of their influence on artistic production, public, cultural and artistic institutions and education. In all of these contexts, the term “state” is taken to stand for a political project to assert sovereignty over a specific territory and its inhabitants, with ineluctable effects on economic, social, and cultural life within this territory. Whether they were monarchies, republics, federations or centralized bureaucracies, states played an extremely important role in the production of art and in the institutionalization of knowledge, culture and aesthetic practice in all parts of Europe throughout the aforementioned period. By fabricating their visual identity, commissioning works from particular artists and censoring those spheres of art production that they judged potentially dangerous to their survival, states have shaped art scenes in all parts of Europe. Additionally, cultural and educational policies have influenced, and continue to affect, the formation of knowledge about the arts and educational content in the field of art (history) at all levels of education. ese phenomena and topics pertaining to the broadly defined field of art history (painting, sculpture, applied arts, graphic design, photography, architecture, urban planning, curricula and study programmes in art history, etc.), but also to other related disciplines, will be explored at this conference by 81 participants, including the two keynote speakers: Andreas Nierhaus, a curator at the Wien Museum and Mirko Ilić, a New York-based graphic designer. Our participants come from Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Czechia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Ukraine, the United States of America, and Croatia. e conference sessions have been organised thematically and chronologically in order to adapt as much as possible to the interests of the presenters. Several conference papers will provide insights into the situation in the Habsburg Empire in the 19th and early 20th centuries, when this polity played a significant role in the birth of modernism. e largest number of presenters will examine developments in 20th-century art, particularly art from the period between the two World Wars, which was marked by the collapse of great empires and the creation of national states (often in conflict with one another), the period of the Second World War, and the post-war division of Central Europe into communist and capitalist countries. Frequent changes of borders, wars and social experiments across Central Europe make the 20th century extremely fruitful for studying the relationship between the state and artistic production. Separate sessions are dedicated to topics dealing with cultural policies; protection of monuments; the relationship between church and state in artistic domains; contemporary influences of reactionary regimes on art; art in transition periods; and the various ways that countries and states have presented themselves to the world through exhibitions. e abstracts for our conference reflect a multitude of different methodological approaches and a wealth of research biographies ranging from senior, more experienced researchers to doctoral students, a diversity that will certainly contribute to intergenerational cooperation and the transfer of knowledge at and through the conference. Art and the State in Modern Central Europe is the first conference with this many presenters to be held at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb in a hybrid way (a total of 43 3 presentations will be held in lecture halls, with the remaining 31 delivered online) after multiple lockdowns imposed due to the coronavirus pandemic in 2020–2021, as well as the effects of the two earthquakes that hit Zagreb and north-western Croatia on 22 March and 29 December 2020. Despite these challenges, the conference will take place due to the support of the Croatian Science Foundation, the University of Zagreb and the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb. In the light of these unfortunate circumstances and challenges, we would like to think of this conference as an indicator of the resilience of both art history and the humanities. Accordingly, we also hope to create links to the current situation in the city and the conference topic. is is why the Zagreb City Centre Tour scheduled for the last day of the conference will focus on the buildings and parts of the city that suffered the most in the 2020 earthquakes. Our tour will not only provide the participants with insight into the extent of heritage damage, but will also to point out the approaches and problems that have arisen, and will continue to arise for years to come, concerning their renewal. Although coronavirus measures are still in place, we decided on a hybrid model for the conference because we believe that when sharing the same physical space, the connection among researchers is the most fruitful, and enables the most efficient dissemination of knowledge and methodologies. In-person interactions also facilitate networking and pave the way for new joint projects, publications, conferences, meetings, and the like. We are planning to publish the conference proceedings in the next two years. Given the thematic, geographical and chronological diversity of the papers, this publication will assemble a cross-section of the current state of research and a variety of methodological approaches in the field of art history and other humanities. Furthermore, it will significantly expand collective knowledge about various artistic developments spanning the period from the late 18th century to the present day in the area stretching from the shores of the Mediterranean, to the Baltic and North Sea.
Numerous researchers in various academic disciplines, including art history, history, anthropology, sociology and education, have for decades explored and attempted to define in greater detail both the synchronic and diachronic relationships and mutual influences between state bodies and art production, communication, education and reception. is conference aims to provide insight into the current field of knowledge about and interpretations of these relations from the 18th century to the present day – in other words, beginning from the period in which European states went through intense centralization, leading to the growth of their influence on artistic production, public, cultural and artistic institutions and education. In all of these contexts, the term “state” is taken to stand for a political project to assert sovereignty over a specific territory and its inhabitants, with ineluctable effects on economic, social, and cultural life within this territory. Whether they were monarchies, republics, federations or centralized bureaucracies, states played an extremely important role in the production of art and in the institutionalization of knowledge, culture and aesthetic practice in all parts of Europe throughout the aforementioned period. By fabricating their visual identity, commissioning works from particular artists and censoring those spheres of art production that they judged potentially dangerous to their survival, states have shaped art scenes in all parts of Europe. Additionally, cultural and educational policies have influenced, and continue to affect, the formation of knowledge about the arts and educational content in the field of art (history) at all levels of education. ese phenomena and topics pertaining to the broadly defined field of art history (painting, sculpture, applied arts, graphic design, photography, architecture, urban planning, curricula and study programmes in art history, etc.), but also to other related disciplines, will be explored at this conference by 81 participants, including the two keynote speakers: Andreas Nierhaus, a curator at the Wien Museum and Mirko Ilić, a New York-based graphic designer. Our participants come from Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Czechia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Ukraine, the United States of America, and Croatia. e conference sessions have been organised thematically and chronologically in order to adapt as much as possible to the interests of the presenters. Several conference papers will provide insights into the situation in the Habsburg Empire in the 19th and early 20th centuries, when this polity played a significant role in the birth of modernism. e largest number of presenters will examine developments in 20th-century art, particularly art from the period between the two World Wars, which was marked by the collapse of great empires and the creation of national states (often in conflict with one another), the period of the Second World War, and the post-war division of Central Europe into communist and capitalist countries. Frequent changes of borders, wars and social experiments across Central Europe make the 20th century extremely fruitful for studying the relationship between the state and artistic production. Separate sessions are dedicated to topics dealing with cultural policies; protection of monuments; the relationship between church and state in artistic domains; contemporary influences of reactionary regimes on art; art in transition periods; and the various ways that countries and states have presented themselves to the world through exhibitions. e abstracts for our conference reflect a multitude of different methodological approaches and a wealth of research biographies ranging from senior, more experienced researchers to doctoral students, a diversity that will certainly contribute to intergenerational cooperation and the transfer of knowledge at and through the conference. Art and the State in Modern Central Europe is the first conference with this many presenters to be held at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb in a hybrid way (a total of 43 3 presentations will be held in lecture halls, with the remaining 31 delivered online) after multiple lockdowns imposed due to the coronavirus pandemic in 2020–2021, as well as the effects of the two earthquakes that hit Zagreb and north-western Croatia on 22 March and 29 December 2020. Despite these challenges, the conference will take place due to the support of the Croatian Science Foundation, the University of Zagreb and the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb. In the light of these unfortunate circumstances and challenges, we would like to think of this conference as an indicator of the resilience of both art history and the humanities. Accordingly, we also hope to create links to the current situation in the city and the conference topic. is is why the Zagreb City Centre Tour scheduled for the last day of the conference will focus on the buildings and parts of the city that suffered the most in the 2020 earthquakes. Our tour will not only provide the participants with insight into the extent of heritage damage, but will also to point out the approaches and problems that have arisen, and will continue to arise for years to come, concerning their renewal. Although coronavirus measures are still in place, we decided on a hybrid model for the conference because we believe that when sharing the same physical space, the connection among researchers is the most fruitful, and enables the most efficient dissemination of knowledge and methodologies. In-person interactions also facilitate networking and pave the way for new joint projects, publications, conferences, meetings, and the like. We are planning to publish the conference proceedings in the next two years. Given the thematic, geographical and chronological diversity of the papers, this publication will assemble a cross-section of the current state of research and a variety of methodological approaches in the field of art history and other humanities. Furthermore, it will significantly expand collective knowledge about various artistic developments spanning the period from the late 18th century to the present day in the area stretching from the shores of the Mediterranean, to the Baltic and North Sea.
EXAMPLES OF EXPERIMENTAL ART PRACTICE AND INTERNATIONAL CULTURAL COLLABORATIONS DURING THE 1960S AND 1970S ON THE TERRITORY OF FORMER YUGOSLAVIA AND SOCIALIST COUNTRIES BEHIND THE IRON CURTAIN
DOROTEA FOTIVEC OČIĆ, Institute for the Research of the Avant-Garde, Zagreb, Croatia
IVANA JANKOVIĆ, Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb, Croatia
This research is divided into two case studies. e first case study involves the example of radical Neo-avant-garde artistic practices in the former Czechoslovakia and Poland that were banned for ideological reasons during the Cold War. e examples come from the Marinko Sudac Collection, and such works comprise its long-term collecting strategy. e cultural field in the countries behind the Iron Curtain took on the role of a presentational platform for the ideological programme of the totalitarian regime. State cultural councils dictated the artistic paradigm (Socialist Realism), approved the printing of publications, and approved artistic and other cultural projects in the countries and abroad. According to Miklós Haraszti, in Poland in the 1970s, artists and intellectuals worked in the so-called “velvet prison”, as long as they were created within the realm of pure and politically non-engaged art. In Czechoslovakia, by contrast, after the Red Army’s 1968 invasion of Prague, a period of so-called “normalisation” arose (after 1972), due to the threat of Soviet ideology. At that time, exhibiting in public institutions and other public spaces was forbidden to all experimental artists, while any attempt to exhibit abroad was in most cases sabotaged by the state apparatus. Some examples of the censorship of projects indicate control over public and private life, which has not always been of equal intensity. e second study consists of examples of international projects organised during the 1960s and 1970s in the former Yugoslavia. Particular focus is placed on the participation of radical Neo-avant-garde artists of experimental artistic practices from former Czechoslovakia and Poland. Their presence and activity on the art scene outside the Eastern Bloc depended on the degree of cultural control of countries’ policies. The examples discussed are cases where artists from countries behind the Iron Curtain managed to circumvent regime politics. The specific political Yugoslav enclave, especially with the founding of the Independent Movement (1961), influenced the gradual liberalisation of social and artistic life. e policy of socialism with a human face gave greater freedom to progressive artists and institutions such as the Gallery of Contemporary Art and the Students’ Centre Gallery in Zagreb. It also encouraged the opening and operation of numerous independent exhibitions at the initiative of prominent cultural professionals. throughout the years, these venues hosted a large number of artists, artist groups, art historians and critics, as well as many highly important events and projects, open to both the East and the West. In this context, research on the archival material and documentation of institutions and private collections is of particular value. This research aims to identify and contextualise the space of meeting and exchange of ideas between artists. It also looks at the initiatives of curators and other cultural workers in the former Yugoslavia and the so-called Eastern Bloc in the circumstances of a world divided into two blocs.