Magdalena Nieslony
Art as a Medium of Encounter. Social Conflicts in Polish
Contemporary Art

In my lecture I will look at an example of recent Polish art, the monumental two-channel video installation "The Thousand Year Plan" (2021) by Agnieszka Polska. I will interpret the work against the background of the country's current political situation, which is characterised by a sharp polarisation between the conservative and progressive forces. In particular, I will look at the role of historiography as a means of national identity formation, currently controlled by the right-wing administration, but also critically  reflected in art.

Magdalena Nieslony teaches Global Contemporary Art at the University of Vienna. She studied art history and philosophy at Goethe University Frankfurt am Main, and Université de Paris X-Nanterre. She has been a research associate at Goethe University Frankfurt a.M., University of Heidelberg, and University of Stuttgart, a postdoctoral fellow at the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz/MPI, a fellow at the Terra Foundation and the Getty Research Institute, and a visiting professor at Humboldt University in Berlin. Her book "Bedingtheit der Malerei. Ivan Puni und die Moderne Bildkritik" has been published in 2016. She is the co-editor of "Theorie². Potenzial und Potenzierung künstlerischer Theorie" (2014), and of "Format. Politiken der Normierung in den Künsten ab 1960" (2020), and the editor of "Ethische Wertschöpfung. Moralische Kriterien in der zeitgenössischen Kunst und Kritik" (special issue of „21: Inquiries into Art, History, and the Visual“, 2022).

Contact: fridolin.goebel@khi.fi.it