Announcing a new journal: Art East/Central

We have exciting news!

Art East/Central is our new English-language, open access and peer-reviewed journal that will publish original articles on architecture, design and the visual arts in central and east-central Europe from 1800 to the present day. The journal will also include book and exhibition reviews, reports and occasional discussion forums.  The international editorial board and a rigorous, double-blind peer review process will ensure high quality and originality of the published texts.

We welcome your submissions to be considered for future issues at journal@arteastcentral.eu.  We are particularly interested in contributions that adopt a transnational approach, examining practices, ideas and traditions that cross the political, linguistic, ethnic, and cultural boundaries of the region. Interdisciplinary approaches, as well as reflection on the particular challenges this region raises for relevant academic practices, are also encouraged. Submissions from graduate students are welcome.

Watch this space for the first issue to be published in early 2021.

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We Are Awarding PhD Studentships

The CRAACE (Continuity/Rupture: Art and Architecture in Central Europe 1918-1939) team is inviting applications from those interested in undertaking PhD research at the Department of Art History, Masaryk University, Brno.

Proposals are particularly encouraged from students with an interest in modernism from the first half of the 20th century, focusing on central and east-central Europe. This may be about topics in the history of art, design and architecture, art criticism and theory, as well as the historiography of art. Students will be able to write their research dissertation in English or Czech.

Successful candidates will receive a studentship of CZK 24,000 per month. They will also be eligible for additional support in meeting research costs.

The submission period for applications is: 1 August – 30 November 2020, for enrolment in Spring 2021.

Applicants will need to apply to Masaryk University through the usual application procedure, including a formal research proposal. The details can be  found here: https://www.phil.muni.cz/en/studies/doctoral-degree-study-programme/how-to-apply

Successful applicants will be expected to register for the programme by 1 March 2021. Funding will be available until the end of 2023.

For an initial informal discussion, please contact: Prof. Matthew Rampley, rampley@muni.cz.

More information on the CRAACE project can be found here: https://craace.com

For more information on the Department of Art History see here: https://arthistory.phil.muni.cz/

Neighbours: An Austrian-Czech History Book: Book review

Relationship status: it’s complicated. Summarised in the vernacular of the virtual age, Austrian-Czech relations have long been characterised as uneasy, bolstered by a range of stereotypes established across the past centuries – the Czech as the beer-swelling yokel ‘Václav’, the Austrian as the kaisertreu snobbish brute, or a country bumpkin with right-wing sentiments. Rather than to divulge in these exaggerated characterisations any further – which are often malicious, sometimes humorous, and occasionally contain a grain of truth – Neighbours: An Austrian-Czech History Book draws attention to the joint history of the two countries in a decidedly more positive light.

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A Reader in East-Central-European Modernism: Book Review

In 1927 Kurt Tucholsky published a poem called Das Ideal (The Ideal),[1] in which he pieces together a fantastic wish list for his life including all the money in the world, an endless, but harmless stream of food and alcohol, and his desired apartment. The latter let him see the Alps in the backyard, and Berlin’s Friedrichstraße in the front, with tight-lipped servants, a rooftop tree garden, and 2 ponies, 4 stallions, 8 cars and a motorcycle in the barn. That is what the new Reader in East-Central-European Modernism 1918–1956 edited by Beáta Hock, Klara Kemp-Welch and Jonathan Owen and published online by the Courtauld Institute achieves: an easily accessible resource for an international audience that will serve as an essential point of reference for students and scholars of the field. Bringing together and translating 27 wide-ranging essays, written in Czech, Slovak, Polish or Hungarian, and not available in English before, is a great achievement. The publication was born out of a course on central European modern art and culture in the MA programme at the Courtauld Institute of Art in London. Whereas there were some anthologies of primary sources, which still could be expanded on in the future, there was simply not a sufficient quantity of secondary literature available for the student.[2] In contrast to the plethora of studies on German or Soviet art in the interwar period, there is still to this day a lack of easily accessible English articles on interwar Czech, Hungarian, or Polish art. This new reader makes good that lack, and the editors should be praised highly for their efforts; there are indeed many stallions in the stable.

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CFP: Future Prospects for Art History in Central Europe: Questions, Methods, Topics

CALL FOR PAPERS

Future Prospects for Art History in Central Europe: Questions, Methods, Topics

A workshop organised at Masaryk University, Faculty of Arts, Department of Art History

 on 17-18 June 2020

 What are the most prominent and important issues motivating art historians in east-central Europe at present? Are they methodological? Political? Thematic? Curatorial / museological? Conceptual? Or are they to do with debates relating to a particular period or geographical question?

This workshop is intended to provide a forum for considering answers to that question and for an assessment of the current state of art history in east-central Europe. Its aim, too, is to identify one or more potential projects that might give art historical practice in east-central Europe a higher profile and underpin an application for a European Research Council synergy grant (https://erc.europa.eu/funding/synergy-grants).

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