Fields of work

Methodologically, both the critical examination of the discipline and the examination of its various historical, theoretical and artistic transformations are important. Such an approach requires a reconfiguration of the concept of theory. Accordingly, modernity and modernities are deliberately discussed in the plural. Thus, in the historical analysis of modernity, the concept of "epochal thresholds" (Cornelia Klinger, 1995) and also the "cascades of modernization" (Hans-Ulrich Gumbrecht, 2002) are explicitly examined for their topicality.

In recent years, global art history as well as postcolonial and poststructuralist theory have contributed to a self-reflexive diversification of art historical endeavors. These effects have enabled a discursive shift in previous notions of modernisms, modernities and their inherent epistemological violence, necessitating new concepts and redefinitions of terms.

In his essays "The West and the Rest - Discourse and Power", Stuart Hall examines the role that societies outside Europe played in this process. He examines how an idea of "the West and the Rest" was constituted and how relations between Western and non-Western societies were portrayed. Hall finds that "the West" is an idea rather than a geographical fact, therefore "the West" is a historical and not a geographical construct. He concludes that the meaning of the term is virtually identical to "modern". Furthermore, the curator Okwui Enwezor takes a critical stance towards the idea of proximity to "the West" as a paradigmatic interpretation of non-Western modernism, as this idea contributes to the depoliticization and decontextualization of art production. Instead, Enwezor proposes a "postcolonial response" to the emerging fields of global modernisms, because "in its discursive proximity to Western modes of thought, postcolonial theory transforms this dissent into an enabling agent of historical transformation and thus is able to expose certain Western epistemological limits and contradictions." (Okwui Enwezor, Manifesta Journal, 2002, p. 113)

The research focus is thus concerned both with the "West" as a concept and with the exchange processes and interferences between Europe and North America, as well as the transcontinental connections in art history.

The current political, social, legal and cultural situation of Europe and the positioning of Europe in a global context are given special attention in contemporary art. In art historiography, this state of affairs is being discussed by a critical art history discipline and the striking Eurocentrism of art historiography is being subjected to a critical appraisal.

Issues of migration, "home" and identities are central themes in Europe. Tensions arise between unity and division. These issues are played out in an interesting way through the arts and illuminated from a wide variety of perspectives. In the thematic field of Europe, the critical reflection of Eurocentrism and the "Western view" results in the interesting focus on South-East Europe.

The art scene in North America is also attributed particular dominance, here also in the connection and demarcation to Europe, both historically and at present. However, these ideas contain explicit founding myths that perpetuate the Eurocentrism of art historiography, just as the dominance of North America is accepted unquestioningly. It is precisely these narratives that need to be examined and critically reflected upon. Fundamental questions of art historiography are explicitly inscribed in this subject area and the subject itself is critically researched in historical analysis and with regard to the inscription of discourses.

In addition, themes of identity or nation are also of particular importance in North America and, in contrast to Europe, must be understood differently. From a contemporary perspective, it is important to look at divergent narratives and to work and research explicitly against the myth of unity and fixed narratives.

In the face of globalization, we need to rethink the concepts of modernity; the "classical" and any static conceptualization of modernity is insufficient for a deeper investigation of modern art history. Therefore, it is necessary to think about theoretical concepts of modernity that can help us take into account the complexity and diversity of modern and contemporary art. We want to explore discursive shifts, historical experiences and alternative descriptions of modernisms and modernities.

to develop methods of decolonization based on a postcolonial art history.

Since the early 2000s, theoretical concepts and possible ways of expanding the discipline have been discussed and explored in research on global art history. For example, James Elkin's famous question "Is Art History Global?" (2006), for example, points to the fact that the boundaries of a Eurocentric art history have been critically questioned. With the further establishment of global art history, various theoretical foundations have been introduced to develop methodological approaches for the study of non-Western modern and contemporary art. The global approaches in art history are often based on transcultural concepts of global modernities and "entangled histories", such as transnational knowledge transfer, migration of forms and discourses and their interaction with local conditions during decolonization. (Monica Juneja, Christian Kravagna, Kobena Mercer, etc.)

Global art history is also a central methodological approach for the study of modern art from Iran. Transcultural modernism is reflected in Iranian modern art, in which processes of encounter, local translation and adaptation have had a decisive influence on artistic production. A transcultural perspective on Iranian modern art helps to question not only nationalist art historiographies, but also binary divisions between the local and the global.

From a regional perspective, this art could be part of Islamic art history, a discipline that deals with artistic and cultural production in the Middle East in a broader sense. However, art productions from the 20th and 21st centuries from the countries of the Near and Middle East rarely find their way into Islamic art histories. The discipline of Islamic art history developed from orientalist and colonialist strategies of knowledge production about the significant "other" of the West. A canon was created that encompasses art production since the beginning of Islam, but ends around 1800 and excludes modernity. Finbarr Barry Flood showed that the ideological implications of the production of Islamic art produced an imaginary golden age of pre-modernization, thus confirming neoconservative discourses that neglect the ongoing political impact of Western colonialism and imperialism on the region. At the same time, the absence of this modern art history also means that modern and contemporary art from the region is often received and located in a historical vacuum.

Constant migrations have led to new discourses within artistic networks of African artists between diaspora artists and those on the continent. Thus, triggered by the constant movement and relocation of people, categories of identity that were taken for granted are being renegotiated and critically discussed. Okwui Enwezor sees a cosmopolitan African identity in this in-between space that is global and transnational and transcends cultural boundaries.

Both Stuart Hall and Kobena Mercer, as well as Paul Gilroy, include transatlantic exchange as a central feature in their understanding of the concept of the African diaspora. With his diasporic model of critique, which places a particular focus on cross-cultural aesthetic strategies, Kobena Mercer discusses the cultural and political contexts surrounding the art of African-American and black British artists, thus emphasizing a recasting of global contemporary art and the history of modernism itself. In his book "The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness" from 1993, Paul Gilroy draws on the term Black Atlantic to examine the exchange between black cultures around the Atlantic and thus discuss cultural hybridity. The Black Atlantic describes a transnational space of exchange, which is taken into account as a theoretical framework in this field of work. Stuart Hall, following Gilroy, develops a postcolonial diaspora concept in his theoretical approach and emphasizes heterogeneity and diversity within it, while at the same time discussing hierarchies in postcolonial cultures.

The questions of postcolonial theory and art, about the cultural legacies and consequences of colonialism as well as the questioning of national and cultural identities, are to be used productively in this field of work, in the sense of a dynamic concept of culture, in order to sharpen the critical view of stereotyping images that can be traced back to colonialist and imperialist backgrounds, for example, and at the same time to shed light on aspects such as structural exclusion and oppression.

political responsibility, ecology, environmental justice, the Anthropocene, climate change, resources and sustainability. This focus explicitly refers to the long-standing, international project Naturally Hypernatural which deals with various concepts of nature and the environment in modern and contemporary art and culture in different directions and focal points.

For some time now, current trends in contemporary art have been heralding a "rediscovery" of nature and its significance for art. In dealing with these phenomena, the aim is on the one hand to identify the underlying concepts of nature. Where do their historical roots lie, how have behaviors and patterns of perception developed over the epochs and what part does art play in these concepts of nature? How can the relationship between artificiality and naturalness be understood in terms of the aesthetics of nature? On the other hand, it is about dealing with the signs of a "phenomenology of nature" and with the sensual approach to nature. The anthropocentric approach, as represented by Hartmut Böhme, for example, is to be expanded in the sense of a "biological phenomenology". Accordingly, a distinction is no longer made between an observed
(natural) phenomenon and the observer, but both are understood as part of an overall process. The process of perception can no more be separated from the 'how' of perception than from the structure of what is perceived, of which the perceiver himself is a part.

The research also deals with the topic of Eco Criticism and how it is applied and implemented in contemporary art, as well as how it is treated in art historiography. In the spirit of interdisciplinarity, scientists from a wide range of disciplines can work together with artists on these topics. Art can play an important mediating role here, opening up perspectives for enlightenment and awareness. Ecological aspects of society and the present as well as the Anthropocene are examined and researched.

The focus is also dedicated to a history of knowledge in the arts with regard to the genesis of their epistemes and methods as well as the direct exchange and transfer between the arts and other knowledge systems. Since the focus area addresses the specific knowledge of the arts, it not only deals with artistic processes, media and techniques and the knowledge associated with them, but also repeatedly works directly with artists, scientists and curators on specific topics, with the aim of being able to observe and analyze the resulting exchange processes in statu nascendi in order to develop a methodological and systematic history of artistic practice and theory as well as contemporary artistic knowledge.

As Wittgenstein already stated, the arts also have something to teach, which leads to the conclusion that art must also contain knowledge. This raises the question of how we can speak of art as a specific production of knowledge? Furthermore, art as knowledge production is at the center of an ongoing debate between the humanities and the sciences regarding its capabilities and relevance for the organization of knowledge, culture and life. This debate turns out to be a competition over who has the better position in clarifying what we know, why we know it, where this knowledge production takes place and how it can be described.

Important methodological approaches that describe the questions of knowledge production in art develop from new approaches that can be found in the work of Alva Noë and Graham Harman. Noë's approach combines philosophical research and art to develop "strange tools" - new methods, techniques and dissemination structures that would capture the production of knowledge in the arts. The arts are essential to Graham Harman's work as these object ontologies form knowledge outside the scientific paradigm.

The processes and products of artistic endeavor are understood as a kind of inquiry that significantly shapes the knowledge of society. This change in the status of art from a more descriptive, aestheticizing activity to an analytical, experimental investigation is particularly evident in technologies and branches of research that are currently the subject of much debate. Works of art are now understood as laboratory experiments or investigations into the condition and responsibility of a subject, for whom artistic works become systems of experience and self-observation. Artworks as such are therefore seen as models of perception in which the artistic intention investigates the specific conditions between an individual and the situation surrounding him or her.

The focus is also on selected moments in the history of knowledge production in the arts. This includes examining the transfer of knowledge between art and knowledge production from the middle of the 20th century onwards, taking into account the parallel development of media technologies. A particular focus here is on research into CalArts and Black Mountain College. Specifically, the historical significance of Black Mountain College and CalArts in the production of knowledge in the arts is examined.