Foucault: Art, Histories, and Visuality in the 21st Century OCAD (Ontario College of Art and Design) University, Toronto/Tkaronto, Canada, May 29-30, 2024

The French philosopher Michel Foucault’s (1926–84) work has had a major effect on scholars of art and visuality since Les Mots et les choses (1966) appeared in English in 1970 as The Order of Things. His radical ideas galvanized artists and art writers into many different directions: to insert ruptures and incoherence into history; to reimagine the subject, subjectivity, and identity; to politicize the realms of vision, visuality, and visibility; to formulate critical approaches to technology and media; and to scrutinize the inner workings of art institutions, including museums, schools, and archives. The versatility of Foucault’s thought greatly contributed to major shifts across disciplines, including the interventions of the “new art history” in the 1970s, multiculturalism and identity politics in the 1980s, visual and cultural studies in the 1990s, the questions of contemporaneity and globalization in this century. Owing to the posthumous publications of his lectures and the papers deposited at archives internationally, Foucault’s oeuvre continues to shape current discussions on methodological, political, and ethical assumptions regarding visualities and art histories forty years after his death.

Proposals can be sent to foucault2024@gmail.com by Jan 22, 2024

Full details here.