An Opportunity…?

Association of Art Historians 40th Annual Conference 10-12 April 2014

The Royal College of Art, London

Call for Papers: Expanded Photography

Session Chair: Dr. Lucy Soutter, The Royal College of Art

Contemporary artists are transforming our understanding of photography by combining it with other forms and activities. Many recent works incorporating photography have material or spatial aspects, overlapping with painting, sculpture, installation or architecture. Others emphasize action or the passage of time, combining photography with elements of moving image, performance or audience participation. Digital technology provides yet further hybrid manifestations of photography within art. While many such works have roots in the conceptual art of the 1960s-70s or in the more recent activities of “new media” there are many that could not have been conceived before the present era. How are we to undertand such practices? What is their relationship to the history of photography and the history of art more broadly?

The panel considers the current extensions of photography within the expanded field of contemporary art. Papers may address questions including: to what extent do contested notions of medium remain useful? Should we follow George Baker in regarding photography as merely one form among others, no longer a destination in itself? Is it productive to consider practices that combine photography with other forms alongside one another, and what might it contribute to our understanding to do so? How do these concerns relate to existing theories of the photographic? What are the implications for the future study of photography?

Abstracts of less than 250 words + CV or short bio may be sent to lucy.soutter@rca.ac.uk before 11 November, 2013.

Responses will be sent by 20 November.