The Transformative Potential of the Arts and the Operationality of their Temporality
Artists and cultural practitioners are confronting the social, political and ecological crises of the present with specific practices whose transformative potential has been widely discussed by art and cultural institutions in recent years. Aspects of reparation and preparation in particular have also become the focus of art theory debates. These approaches often go far beyond simply pointing out grievances and disaster scenarios. Rather, they explore new approaches that aim to create a space for dialog, understanding, consolation, reparation and empowerment. Implicitly and explicitly, these practices always use, assume and formulate different and differentiating concepts of time. They use time as material and resource, which require shaping and forming in the first place. Accordingly, a diverse picture can be drawn of overlapping time horizons and requirements, colliding time constraints and strategic long-term planning, end-time moods, tipping points that have been passed and acceleration effects, preparatory measures and delaying tactics, through to euphoric renewals of technological progress ideologies – in short, a juxtaposition of standstill, simultaneity and acceleration.
The annual conference of the doctoral program Epistemologies of Aesthetic Practices is dedicated to the reflection of concepts of time in contemporary aesthetic practices with regard to a general transformative potential. Current references to time and their performance in the arts are to be viewed as fundamentally intertwined.