Network rationale
The objective of the ANTART Network is to advance the scholarship, discussion, and presence of anthropological approaches to the arts. It also seeks to build on its existing network of scholars, artists, and institutions to continue its exchanges with alternative cultural production venues in future EASA locations, thus building links between the university and other public or civil society initiatives. The Anthropology and the Arts network aims to attract researchers working in the arts including but also beyond visual media, including the performative arts, music and sound, theatre, design, architecture, etc. This vast field of research is blooming, but currently underrepresented in EASA. The ANTART network does not contrast other networks, but rather complements them. We are therefore also interested in facilitating cross-over discussions and memberships with other networks in EASA.
Background 2012-2019
The first discussions to form this network took place at the EASA conference in Paris in 2012, but back then, after some debate, we decided to restrict the network to an interest group within VANEASA. At the next EASA in Tallin in 2014, this interest group convened a Lab (L200 Anthropologies of Art) to generate a group discussion around shared objectives. A central theme that emerged was the uncertainty and diversity around the processes of collaboration between Art and Anthropology.
The next workshop, Encountering Concepts in Art and Anthropology, took place at the Universitat de Barcelona, Spain from 11-12 June 2015. The concepts discussed were: “method/work”, “research”, “creativity”, “participation/exclusion”, “institutions” and “archives.
Following the workshop, we created an open dictionary where the discussion on these concepts will continue.
During the EASA 2016 conference in Milan, an interest group meeting with about thirty participants took place, discussing the future of the group as a Network, which concluded that Roger Sansi and Jonas Tinius would apply for network status within EASA.
The first ANTART network panel entitled ‘Art and Nativism’ (P098) took place during the 2018 EASA conference in Stockholm, which also supported a range of experimental labs and other related panels. In 2019, the ANTART network held its first interim meeting (The Trouble with Art. Philistinism, Iconoclasm, and Scepticism of Art in Anthropology) organised by the founding convenors, and held at the Centre for Anthropological Research on Museums and Heritage (CARMAH), Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. The papers from this meeting are the basis for a volume edited by Jonas Tinius and Roger Sansi (2023) with contributions by George Marcus, Liz Hallam, and other network members.
Following EASA regulations, the network collectively agreed on two new convening teams 2020-2022, and also provisionally for 2022-2024.
