Presentation of the publication L'Internationale - Post-war Avant-gardes between 1957 and 1986

Monday, October 29, 2012, at 5 p.m.
Moderna galerija, Cankarjeva 15, auditorium


You are kindly invited to the presentation of the publication that wraps up the two-year international project L'Internationale. 1957-1986. Art from the decline of modernism to the rise of globalization. L'Internationale is a new form of long-term collaboration between five European museums and artists' archives, founded on the initiative of Moderna galerija, which has headed the project since 2010.

L'Internationale is a trans-institutional network of five major European museums and artists? archives (Moderna galerija Ljubljana; Július Koller Society Bratislava/Vienna, MACBA Barcelona, Van Abbemuseum Eindhoven, M HKA Antwerp). Next year, this project will continue and expand to include new partners, among them Museo Reina Sofia, Madrid, and the SALT, Istanbul.

Taking as its starting point these five museums and the respective collections, L'Internationale - Post-War Avant-Gardes between 1957 and 1986 presents a wide range of case studies, historiographic and theoretical essays to newly consider a period in art history that, according to the established canon, has been almost exclusively dominated by Western Europe and North America. In questioning this canon the publication works to acknowledge the existence of and explore a dispersed, multi-polar, and at times interconnected neo-avant-gardist field that existed (long) before it became common to think according to frameworks of globalization or trans-nationalism. In the process this collection of compelling contributions puts many a central question on the table: To what extent has a common international language existed in art over these three decades, while at the same time local terminologies and approaches might have differed significantly? How were such dispersed forms of knowledge and experience situated in their respective social contexts? What parallels of artistic method appeared across different regions, even continents? Finally, can such local narratives be brought together in a new rhizomatic way, one that works to reshape our ideas of trans-localism and internationalism?

The publication will be presented by its editor Christian Höller. Höller is editor of springerin - Hefte für Gegenwartskunst (www.springerin.at) and has written extensively on art and cultural theory.

Authors of the texts:
Nancy Adajania, Inke Arns, Zdenka Badovinac, Boris Buden, Jan Ceuleers, José Díaz Cuyás, Eda Čufer, Bart De Baere, Charles Esche, Cristina Freire, Teresa Grandas, Daniel Grún, Ksenya Gurshtein, Jan Hoet, Christian Höller, Vitaly Komar, Lars Bang Larsen, Bartomeu Marí, Marga van Mechelen, Armin Medosch, Viktor Misiano, Piotr Piotrowski, Bojana Piškur, Georg Schöllhammer, Branka Stipanćić, Steven ten Thije, Wim Van Mulders, Immanuel Wallerstein

The introductory presentation of the project will be delivered by the Director of MG+MSUM Zdenka Badovinac. The presentation of the publication will be in English.