Avant-garde et guerre / Avant-garde and War (9e congrès du Réseau européen de recherche sur l'avant-garde et le modernisme, Cracovie)

CALL FOR PAPERS

Avant-Garde and War

9th Conference of the European Network for Avant-Garde and Modernism Studies (EAM)

Cracow, Jagiellonian University

17-19 September 2024

The term avant-garde – ‘advance guard’ or ‘vanguard’ – suggests military language and
contexts related to violence, destruction, demolition, rebellion, and revolution. Descriptions
of the historical avant-gardes as artistic and ideological formations accordingly
often emphasize the turn against tradition, the rebellion against stagnant categories, the
destructive potential of certain ideas, and the constant attempts to violently transgress
boundaries in art. The substrate of the avant-gardes, also in the later 20th century and in
our own, is conflict and destruction, one of the guiding principles of avant-garde and
modernist thought and practice being to build and create on the ruins of the past. War
indeed is rarely absent from the avant-garde community of experience – whether as world
wars, civil wars, terror, revolutions, totalitarianism, occupation, liberation struggles – so
much so that some scholars see these events, especially the destructive power of the war
machine, as the ‘tragic defeat of modernity’. However, our models of avant-garde and
modernist practices across all of the arts up until the present day should not be limited to
the self-image of the avant-gardes as revolutionaries, rebels and demolitionists. Wars have
also ushered in new beginnings, offering opportunities for avant-gardes to further their
missions, or causing them to re-appraise and adapt to changed circumstances.
How, then, do the avant-gardes inhabit war – and how does war inhabit the avantgardes?
The organizers invite innovative and freshly-researched proposals for creative and critical
presentations – in all areas of avant-garde and modernist practice across all of the arts –
which frame and re-frame our thinking about avant-gardism/modernism and war.

Suggested topics include :

war as a catalyst for the avant-garde
 avant-gardes as a catalyst for conflict
 avant-gardes at war
 avant-garde as a militaristic cultural formation
 the relation of artistic and social programs in times of war
 antiwar avant-gardes
 wartime fate of avant-garde artists
 military service and the home front
 national culture in times of civil war
 art across the frontline: the internationalism of art in times of division
 political and social instrumentalization of the arts during wartime
 avant-gardes and propaganda
 responses to the brutality of war
 the trauma of violence, rape, displacement and loss in avant-garde practice
 avant-gardes and the challenge of Shoah
 modernist identities and bodies in times of war
 feminist writers and artists on war
 industrial war
 the music of war
 avant-garde spaces in wartime
 living with/resisting occupation
 the end of war and the ‘rappel à l’ordre’
defeat as a topic, problem and challenge
 avant-gardes and reconstruction in postwar societies
 avant-gardes in the nuclear age and during the Cold War
 avant-gardes in the struggle for decolonization
war and revolution in the avant-garde imaginary
 anticipations of peace and war in avant-garde and modernist writing

We look forward to welcoming you in Cracow on 17-19 September 2024!

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SUBMISSIONS

The official languages of this conference are English, French and German.
You may submit a proposal for a panel or for an individual paper. A panel consists of three
or four speakers. One of the speakers is the chair who makes the submission and supplies
the details and proposals of all of the proposed participants. Panels should not consist only
of doctoral students. You may submit an individual proposal without specifying a panel and
the organizers will assign your paper to a panel if accepted.

Please send panel and individual proposals to: eam9cracow@gmail.com.
Deadline for panel and individual proposals: 1 March 2024.
Acceptance of proposals will be notified via email in the end of April 2024.

Conference registration fees will only be payable after this point.
Early-bird registration fee, up to June 5 2022: €170 (€120 + €50 EAM membership fee)
Standard registration fee, June 6 to July 5: €200 (€150 + €50 EAM membership fee)
A conference program will be available on the EAM9 website before the summer.