Thursday, January 21, 2016, 10am–6:30pm
Friday, January 22, 2016, 10am–5:30pm
Royal Institute of Art
Flaggmansvägen 1, Skeppsholmen
111 49 Stockholm
Sweden
Useless Uses is an international conference organized by the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm in cooperation with the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy (CRMEP), Kingston University London. Speakers will consider the concept of use in its philosophical, economic and artistic meanings, along a trajectory running from Soviet Constructivism through Situationism to today’s Network Activism. International contributors from philosophy, politics, political economy, art history and art production will consider the heritage of the contradictory double coding of “use” in the context of art, in the “double character” of the commodity form, in the opposition of the social functionality of “use” versus the promissory “usefulness,” wherein the lack of a social function appears as a condition of art’s criticality and utopian promise. Where does art stand in relation to these discourses today?
Contributors to the conference include: Éric Alliez, Professor of Modern European Philosophy at (CRMEP), Kingston University London & Professor of Philosophy and Contemporary Creations in Art, University of Paris 8; Étienne Balibar, Anniversary Chair of Modern European Philosophy at (CRMEP), Kingston University London and Visiting Professor at Columbia University, New York; Melanie Gilligan, visual artist and PhD Candidate at Royal Institute of Art, Goldin+Senneby, visual artists, with Théo Bourgeron, sociologist of finance; Christina Kiaer, Associate Professor in the Department of Art History, Northwestern University; Mara Lee, poet, writer and scholar; Peter Osborne, International Visiting Chair in Philosophy in the Context of Art, at Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm and Professor of Modern European Philosophy and Director of (CRMEP), Kingston University London; Hito Steyerl, filmmaker, visual artist, author, and Professor of New Media Art at Berlin University of the Arts; and McKenzie Wark, Professor of Media and Cultural Studies at The New School, New York City.
The conference is an extension of the RIA’s course Philosophy in the Context of Art, which contributes to the institution’s research platform that explores contemporary philosophical approaches to art and culture.
The conference is free and open to the public.
Link to the programme
For further information and advance registrations, please contact:
Research Coordinator Åsa Andersson: [email protected]
About the Royal Institute of Art Stockholm
The Royal Institute of Art is a leading art institution of higher education located in Stockholm that offers both undergraduate and postgraduate studies in Fine Arts and postgraduate studies in Architecture.
