Contemporary Prehistories: A Workshop on Contemporary Approaches to Prehistoric Art

However, the interdisciplinary workshop takes prehistoric art as a starting point for questioning, for instance, the claims for aesthetic universals and for exploring how modern and contemporary art uses the primordial and prehistoric to constitute its own history.

For two centuries, as sites were discovered in Europe, Africa, Oceania and the Americas, so-called ‘early art’ or ‘primitive art’ has not only had a worldwide impact on the notion of human creativity, but has also been appropriated by western art and cultural history as a source of formal innovation, especially in the case of the avant-gardes. The phenomenon of prehistoric art initiated a reflection on notions, for instance, of the aboriginal, primal, vernacular and genuine as much as on the historic idea of the return and has inspired the imaginary of an un-mediated access to basic truths.

On the occasion of recent publications and exhibitions, the workshop aims at reconsidering the prehistoric aesthetic discourse from a contemporary and interdisciplinary perspective, involving anthropologists, art historians and artists as to discuss the respective methodological approaches and recurrent notions of universality, primitivism and originality in theory and practice.

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2:00–2:15 pm
Welcome
Tanja Michalsky, Bibliotheca Hertziana

2:15–2:30 pm
Introduction
Nuria Sanz, H.E.A.D.S., UNESCO Programme on Human Evolution

2:30–3:10 pm
How to Find, Contextualize and Interpret the Earliest Figurative Art and Musical Instruments
Nicholas Conard, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen

3:10–3:50 pm
Can We Approach the Meaning of Paleolithic Art? An Archeological Perspective
Margherita Mussi, Università degli Studi di Roma La Sapienza

3:50–4:20 pm
Coffee Break

4:20–5:00 pm
Prehistoric Modernity: Another Narrative?
Maria Stavrinaki, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne

5:00–5:40 pm
Anarcheology Museum – Connecting Fragments with Narrations
Christoph Keller, Artist and Researcher, Berlin

5:40–6:20 pm
Camille Henrot's Prehistoric Collections
Tristan Weddigen, Bibliotheca Hertziana

6:20–7:00 pm
Response and Discussion
Tommaso Casini, Libera Università di Lingue e Comunicazione IULM, Milano
Tanja Michalsky, Bibliotheca Hertziana

Part of the event: Non Farmi Muro! Settimana tedesca in Italia

Contact
nonfarmimuro@rom.diplo.de

Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History
via Gregoriana 28
00187 Rome
www.biblhertz.it

Contact
Mara Freiberg Simmen
freiberg@biblhertz.it
T. +39 06 69993 460

Raffaele Rossi
rossi@biblhertz.it
T. +39 06 69993 257