ABSTRACT

This book analyses the intermeshing of state power and art history in Europe since 1945 and up to the present from a critical, de-centered perspective.

Devoting special attention to European peripheries and to under-researched transnational cultural political initiatives related to the arts implemented after the end of the Second World War, the contributors explore the ways in which this relationship crystallised in specific moments, places, discourses and practices. They make the historic hegemonic centres of the discipline converse with Europe’s Southern and Eastern peripheries, from Portugal to Estonia to Greece.

By stressing the margins’ point of view this volume rethinks the ideological grounds on which art history and the European Union have been constructed as well as the role played by art and culture in the very concept of ‘Europe.’

section Section 1|78 pages

Europe After the Rain

chapter 2|16 pages

The Allied Cultural Policies in Germany

Between ‘Re-Education’ and the Politicisation of the Arts (1945–1949)

chapter 3|26 pages

UNESCO’s Colour Reproductions Project

Bringing (French) Art to the World

chapter 4|16 pages

Curatorial Experiments at the National Gallery After the Second World War

Reframing History and the Pursuit of Aesthetic Experience

chapter 5|18 pages

The Venice Biennale at its Turning Points

1948 and the Aftermath of 1968

section Section 2|92 pages

Re-Reading Cold War Narratives

chapter 6|22 pages

Artists in Service of the Masses

The Untold Story of the Yugoslav Socialist Realist Project

chapter 7|24 pages

The Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade and Post-Revolutionary Desire

Producing the Art History Narrative of Yugoslav Modern Art

chapter 8|18 pages

Simultaneous Equations

Early Cold War Cultural Politics and the History of Art in Greece

chapter 9|12 pages

Cold War Art Historiography

Some Observations on an Interdisciplinary Approach Through the Social Sciences

chapter 10|14 pages

Something Is Happening Here

Spaces and Figures of Change in Post-War Portugal

section Section 3|76 pages

A New Europe?

chapter 12|16 pages

Official Art Becoming Resistance

Adopting the Discourse of ‘Dissent’ into Estonian Art History Writings

chapter 13|23 pages

Gender and Art History in Poland

A Constant Story of Subversion

chapter 14|18 pages

Narrating Dissident Art in Spain

The Case of Desacuerdos. Sobre Arte, Políticas y Esfera Pública (2003–2005)