This program is free and open to the public. Seating is first come, first served.
Islamic art history is an object-centered discipline. Its subject matter generally fits into a frame, vitrine, or photograph. Recent scholarship has departed from these rigid image boundaries, investigating the affective and performative qualities of Islamic artworks. This conference takes the next step and explores the significance of process itself in art-making, in time-based art forms such as performance art and moving images, as well as in conceptualizations of art as Islamic. The papers address Islamic art and related practices of the twentieth and twenty-first century from China, South Asia, the Middle East, Europe, and North America. The angle on the aesthetic value of process thereby opens new perspectives on how artists have shaped, claimed, and reclaimed Islamic art histories and futures.

The conference includes presentations from scholars, curators, and artists: Ali Nobil Ahmad (Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient), Charlotte Bank (independent scholar, Berlin), Özde Çeliktemel-Thomen (University College London), Timur Hammond (Syracuse University), Nadia Kurd (Thunder Bay Gallery), Emily Neumeier (Ohio State University), and Elizabeth Rauh (University of Michigan). Martina Becker (University of Michigan) will introduce the conference theme and co-moderate the concluding roundtable together with Iftikhar Dadi (Cornell University).

For the full conference program, please visit the U-M History of Art website.

This conference is organized by Martina Becker, Visiting Assistant Professor, U-M History of Art. It is funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 program and sponsored by the U-M History of Art Department, the Department of Near Eastern Studies, and UMMA.