This working group begins from a recognition that meaning-production can be a violent tool of categorizing and othering and that the concept of “research” has long been built on the condition of “extractivism.”

Artistic research dismisses the fantasy of creating transparent messages in order to transmit its findings. As art practice it deals with and reflects on aesthetic forms. I understand aesthetic form to describe all ways of appearing, including the specific spatial arrangement and temporal movement in works of art and other cultural products, and there is no aesthetic form without aesthetic politics. (1)

An aspect of the work of this group is to challenge, undermine, and transcend these processes. Refusal, opacity, and abjection are among some of the possible political-aesthetic ways of working in the field of art that are considered by the group.

Members of the working group include:

Academy of Fine Arts Vienna is the initiator of this group:

Berhanu Ashagrie (PhD. Candidate Academy of Fine Arts Vienna)
Prof. Renate Lorenz (Academy of Fine Arts Vienna)
Prof. Anette Baldauf (Academy of Fine Arts Vienna)

Dr. Azadeh Fatehrad (KUL/The Warburg Institute London)

– the working group is developing and expanding its membership, and in the interim WG4 Contact Mick Wilson (Hdk-Valand, Univ. of Gothenburg.)

Upcoming activities
The programme of activity for 2024 will be announced 30 March 2024.

(1) Citation from Renate Lorenz “UNFINISHED GLOSSARY OF ARTISTIC RESEARCH”, Futures of Artistic Research, Helsinki, 2017.