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CAA Affiliated Societies and CAA Professional Committee - Sessions Soliciting Contributors


"The Incomplete" in the Long Nineteenth Century
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Interdisciplinary Nineteenth-Century Studies
Nancy Rose Marshall


The Interdisciplinary Nineteenth-Century Studies Association (INCS) at CAA 2025. The theme of our panel is art and imagery related to the concept of “INCompleteS,” broadly construed. Possible topics might include: Unfinished sculptures or paintings; the meaning of the sketch; art that thematized ideas of absence, the partial, the fragmented, or the dismembered; fiction or criticism treating the undeveloped or unfinished artwork; or disability studies perspectives that counter nineteenth-century definitions of deficiency. We are especially looking for interdisciplinary papers that consider how notions of “the incomplete” might in turn shed light on the nineteenth-century investment in the idea of whole and the totalizing. Topics from “the long nineteenth century” of any country or culture welcome.


Activating Community through Collaboration
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Women's Caucus for Art
Rachel Epp Buller


“Sí, se puede.” “Wir schaffen das.” “We are the 99%.” Social and political movements across demographics frequently invoke the collective we, seeking to build solidarity through a language of shared identity and investment. More than just slogans, such language articulates a collective desire to make change, work together, and seek out community. The history of the Women’s Caucus for Art is bound up with the history of the US feminist art movement, in which activating community and creating spaces for collaboration pushed back against then-normative conceptions of an artist as solitary male genius. While much has been written about select feminist collaborations, such as Womanhouse, this panel seeks presentations by artists, curators, and art historians about lesser-known artistic projects, both historical and contemporary, that have activated community through the shared labor of collaboration or collectivity. Specific topics might include, among others: artist collectives; socially engaged curating; identity-based or affinity-based art activism; participatory projects in civic, religious, educational, or carceral settings; public art in rural or urban environments; the art of protest in wartime; intergenerational arts-based collaborations; or grassroots work that seeks to make social, cultural, economic, or political change.


Art History and the Apocalypse
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Services to Historians of Visual Arts Committee
Carmen Ripolles , Chanhee Choi, University of New Mexico and Jenna Ann Altomonte


The Doomsday Clock stands at a minute-and-a-half to midnight. Colonial, neo-colonial, and neo-liberal legacies continue to impede populations throughout the Global South. New conflicts erupt in response to these fraught legacies. Across the globe, record heat waves, catastrophic fires, and storms decimate communities. Partisan politics threaten democracy and civil liberties. In our own institutions - schools, universities, museums, galleries - budgets are slashed, questions of value and relevance are ongoing, and staff are burnt out. In this session sponsored by the Services to Historians of the Visual Arts Committee we explore what it means to “do art history” at a moment perceived by some as apocalyptic. What is the sustainability and future of our field as it relates to current crises? How can practitioners navigate various concerns related to climate change, climate pessimism, classroom and institutional censorship, and other existential issues that currently impact the field?

We are seeking brief (10-15 minute) reflections that frame this question from theoretical, practical, pedagogical, and activist perspectives and welcome submissions from art historians, artists, museum professionals and others.



Art, Its History and Institutions in the Age of AI and Posthumanism
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: International Committee
Mar Morosse, Baruch College and Uranchimeg Tsultem, Herron School of Art and Design, Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis


Inspired by expanding scholarship on posthumanism that ranges from Cary Wolfe’s focus on bioethics, trans-species communication and cognitive science to Timothy Morton’s “Object-Oriented-Ontology” and “hyperobjects,” to scholars such as Ahmed Elgamal, whose research discusses knowledge discovery in art history and AI art generation, this panel proposes an examination of issues surrounding digital virtuality and posthumanism, and their impacts on reshaping art historical narratives and museum practices. Specifically, we are intrigued by how these advancements challenge conventional narratives and methodologies within the field, presenting novel perspectives for comprehending and engaging with art. For instance, the revolutionary impact of NFTs on the art market and the use of DALL-E in artistic creation prompts inquiries into concepts of authorship, innovation, and the intrinsic nature of art itself. How do virtual museums and digital exhibitions contribute to democratization of art? Papers may delve into case studies, theoretical frameworks that illuminate the potential of understanding of human and non-human interactions. This International Committee aims to facilitate a wide-ranging dialogue on the evolving field of art history in the era of posthumanism, challenging traditional disciplinary boundaries and exploring transdisciplinary and inclusive perspectives on non-human agents and technology in art production, interpretation, and dissemination. We seek contributions from voices representing regions often marginalized or excluded from the dominant art-historical narrative, fostering a more diverse and comprehensive understanding of how organic and technological, biological and digital approaches contribute to the evolving discourse.


Censorship, Precarity, and Diversity: A Workshop
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Committee on Diversity Practices
Dr. Nina Horisaki-Christens, PhD, Getty Research Institute , SaeHim Park, Xavier University of Louisiana and Katie Anania, Society of Contemporary Art Historians


Over the past three decades, the adjunctification of higher education and the casualization of museum labor has led to a generalized state of precarity in the arts field. Intersecting with these conditions, we have seen increasing censorship in the wake of new governmental and institutional policies that employ rhetorics of inclusivity to shut down public discussion of the complexities of diversity, equity, accessibility, and inclusion. Yet it is explicitly through increased attention to diversity within and beyond institutional spaces that art has claimed a greater relevance to non-conventional art publics, whether by inviting new publics into museum and academic spaces or bringing art into communities that have not historically had access to cultural resources.

This intersection of precarity and censorship presents a crisis for the art field: how to continue the vital work of diversifying our field when labor and political conditions are inhospitable to open discussion. This workshop is a call for strategic connection and group thinking about the intersection of precarity and censorship in the fields represented by CAA membership: education, artistic practice, museums, non-profits, and publications. We want to hear from a range of voices about their specific experiences of how these current conditions impact our ability to address diversity in its various forms. During the workshop short presentations will be followed by a moderated public discussion toward a goal of outlining possible actions we (participants) could undertake, ideally in further collaborations beyond the workshop, to shift the state of the field.



Creativity, Consumption, and Spectacle: Interrogating “Collectible” Design
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Design Studies Forum
Colin Fanning, Bard Graduate Center and Erica N. Morawski, Pratt Institute


The category of “collectible design” sits at two extremes, describing objects of high aesthetic intentionality, produced in small editions, circulating through the affluent world of private galleries, major auction houses, and commercial spectacles like Design Miami; and mass-produced items with pop-cultural or sentimental appeal, available across a wide retail and informal economy. Both ends of this spectrum complicate the role of design as typically articulated in the design academy and design-historical scholarship. This session seeks contributions that place the notion of design’s collectability—whether “high” or “low”—within broader historical, cultural, and critical frameworks to better understand its rhetorics, economics, and what it might tell us about the shifting meanings and methods of design in late capitalism. In addition to analyses of contemporary design activity, submissions are welcome to explore deeper histories of affluence, affect, and spectacular collecting; we invite critical considerations from practitioners and historians alike. Papers might consider topics such as:

  • Retailers as patrons or partners in design production
  • Material experimentation, manual skill, and formal complexity in design’s desirability
  • The role of commercial ventures in shaping public or scholarly understandings of design
  • Secondary and informal markets for design
  • Galleries’ archival and quasi-didactic ambitions
  • The histories and impacts of urban “design districts”
  • Discourses of race, gender, and queerness in design markets
  • Design educators’ and students’ intersections with collectible design
  • Influencer culture and celebrity consumption in/of design
  • The editorial shaping of design in magazines and other publications


Crip Time: Disabled Spacemaking in the Work of Queercrip Artists
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: The Queer Trans Caucus for Art
Halo Starling, USC School of Cinematic Arts, Department of Media Arts + Practice and Libby Paloma


The session Crip Time considers the work of queercrip[1] artists, activists, and scholars and what their interventions teach us about how we are all impacted by ableism in art institutions. For example, how do queercrip practices create inclusivity in art spaces that are all too often inaccessible? In what ways do queercrip producers critique the inherent limitations of art institutions in the dissemination of their work?

In collaboration with queer and trans activists of color, Black queercrip artist Carolyn Lazard, created Accessibility in the Arts: A Promise and a Practice.[2] The PDF includes the following definition of disability, “an economic, cultural, and/or social exclusion based on a physical, psychological, sensory, or cognitive difference...Disability is structurally reinforced by ableism, a system rooted in the supremacy of non-disabled people and the disenfranchisement of disabled people through the denial of access.” We take this definition as a starting point from which to begin a collaborative conversation about disabled spacemaking in the work of queercrip interventionists.

We encourage submissions that discuss disability justice, notions of accessibility and creative queer and trans disabled interventions. Participants might want to explore the following: queercrip worldbuilding, adaptive technologies, taking naps, color-coded pill cases, hacked compression vests, disability gender abolition, Deaf music, blind photography, disabled spacemaking, plant-based healing remedies, crip-time-based video, “sick” moving images, anti-stair club lounges, ASL stand-up comedy, and more. This session will be both in-person and remote, and accessible.

[1] Artists identifying as queer and disabled.

[2] Accessibility in the Arts: A Promise and a Practice.



Critical AI Literacy in Art and Design Education and Practice
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Professional Practices Committee
Leigh-Ann Pahapill, Bowling Green State University , Charles Kanwischer, Bowling Green State University and Michael Grillo, University of Maine


In light of the rapid development of AI technologies and their increasing impact on art and design education and practice, the Professional Practices Committee (PPC) invites proposals for a panel addressing the critical adoption of AI in these fields as they relate to artists' practices, scholarly standards, and ethics. The panel will focus on "Critical AI Literacy," building on conversations led by the work of Maha Bali and others in AI research and pedagogy. We seek contributions from practitioners and scholars on the thoughtful integration of AI in studio and pedagogical practices, considering the ethical considerations and challenges in human-AI collaborative art-making. We welcome papers that contextualize this moment of technological innovation in artistic research and practice and explore AI-augmented art's potential for fostering critical reflection on AI's cultural, social, and political implications. Possible subtopics include Strategies for incorporating Critical AI Literacy into art and design curricula; Ethical considerations and best practices for human-AI collaboration in artistic practice; The impact of AI on professional practices, such as hiring, tenure, and promotion in art and design fields; AI's potential to reshape artists' practices and the creation, dissemination, and reception of art; and the role of AI in shaping new standards and guidelines for art and design education and practice.


Design Education Futures
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Committee on Design
Andrea Lyn Hempstead, Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi and Delana Gabbard, Southeast Missouri State University


The current state of design education requires that we meet changes in scale, economy, technology, attitudes, and expectations. Gen Z has proven to be the most diverse generation in modern history, valuing inclusion across race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender identity. They see college as a means to launch their careers and use technology as an extension of themselves. This cohort values project-based and applied-learning, which positions graphic design as a field of study that is highly desirable. They overall require more contact with professors and peers and need more guidance on study habits, wellness and communication. As higher education prepares to meet the “enrollment cliff,” how are we as educators providing students with an experience that they cannot afford to miss out on?

This panel welcomes paper presentations that address current and future approaches to meeting student needs in design education.



Design Incubation Colloquium 11.2: Recent Research in Communication Design
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Design Incubation
Camila Afanador-Llach, Florida Atlantic University and Heather Snyder Quinn, DePaul University and Design Incubation


We invite unique proposals on topics relevant to communication design research. Submissions should be design-related case studies, contemporary practice, scholarly research, design theory, design history or design pedagogy. We welcome proposalson a variety of topics. Submit an abstract of 300 words along with title, category (design research, design theory, design history, teaching, or service), keywords (5), citations, name and affiliation.

Please use the Design Incubation abstract submission form found here:

https://designincubation.com/call-for-submissions/

Submissions are double-blind peer reviewed. Reviewers feedback will be returned. Final presentations are limited to a 6-minutes, preferably Pecha Kucha style.The conference session will include a moderated discussion.



Designated Assembly Points: Connecting the Dots in Art Administration
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: National Council of Art Administrators
O. Gustavo Plascencia, New World School of the Arts and Elissa C. Armstrong, VCU School of the Arts


When we assemble, we unite as a community, pooling our ideas and resources while forging meaningful connections within our networks and broader community. Our focus will center on exploring unconventional avenues such as reverse mentorships, cross-sector partnerships, and creative placemaking initiatives. With this panel we will delve into the diverse expressions and concepts of assemblage within the realm of art administration, where the convergence of people, objects, practices, and narratives ignites innovation and drives transformative change.

This panel seeks to amplify both success stories and cautionary tales from the field, illustrating how art administrators and the communities they serve come together to bridge gaps, foster innovation, and propel changemaking in art education. By celebrating collaborative endeavors and sharing insights gained from collective experiences, we aim to inspire and empower participants to harness the power of assemblage in their own educational contexts.



Dialogue and Artistry: Exploring the history, canon and critical reception of artist books
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: College Book Art Association
Peter J. Tanner, University of Utah and Levi Sherman, University of Wisconsin - Madison


Since the 1960s, the field of artist books has witnessed a remarkable expansion of influence, not only permeating libraries and museums, but also transcending disciplinary boundaries. Their unique ability to engage with and challenge standard artistic tropes has propelled them into the forefront of cultural discourse.

Artist books are distinguished by their capacity to foster innovation and their interdisciplinary nature, which can touch on questions of history, art history, literature, printing, critical theory, artistic praxis, and bookmaking.

This call seeks to foster critical dialogue surrounding artist books and book art from a multitude of perspectives. We invite submissions that delve into various facets of book arts criticism and analysis, encompassing themes such as art historical analysis, literary critique, production methodologies, theoretical inquiries, exhibition practices, accessibility concerns, and explorations of cultural, racial, and gender dynamics. We encourage contributions that traverse the intersections of visual, textual, and critical practices, enriching our understanding of the intricate landscape of book art.



Divine Senses: Exploring Sensorial Experiences in Religious Contexts throughout the Premodern Iberian World
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Society for Iberian Global Art
Hannah Maryan Thomson, University of California Los Angeles and Teresa Martínez Martínez, University of Padova


Ocularcentrism has played a major role in the understanding and study of premodern religious art and architecture. Modern museums, screens, and art history classrooms still often privilege the visual over other sensory experiences. However, on the contrary, religious spirituality in the premodern world was intimately tied to multi-sensorial experiences. Could medieval monks understand the space of a cloister without the smell of blooming flowers? Devotional spaces incorporated sounds and smells as much as visual stimulation, and many records exist of embodied religious ecstasy. Through the lens of art history, this Society for Iberian Global Art (SIGA)-sponsored panel seeks to explore how senses other than sight contributed to religious devotion in the premodern Iberian world.

The “sensory turn” in art history, as it has sometimes been referred to, acknowledges the importance of senses other than vision in experiencing art. Along this line of thinking, we invite paper proposals that look beyond vision as the primary conduit for experiencing the holy from scholars of the premodern Iberian world including the Peninsula, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the Philippines. Possible topics might include how ritual music was used (or suppressed) as a part of religious expression in Colonial Mexico, how frankincense and myrrh contributed to Catholic devotion, how pilgrims interacted with saints’ relics through touch or taste in medieval Europe, or the affects of water in Jewish and Islamic holy spaces. We are especially interested in proposals that consider hybrid spaces/objects or that deal with realms of mixed cultural practices.



Everyday and the Expression of Modernity: 19th-century Architecture and Urbanism in the Islamic World
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Historians of Islamic Art Association
Samira Fathi, Michigan State University and Maryam Heydarkhani, Independent Researcher


The entanglement between everyday life and Islamic architecture and urbanism has long been established, yet the 19th-century transformations of this phenomenon remain understudied. Following Westernization and reforms that changed the appearance of cities in the Islamic world, monumental and royal architecture, as the backbone of early modern architecture, was replaced with traces of the mundane and ordinary. This drastic shift has generated divergent narratives linked to the notion of modernity during this period. However, one narrative that holds sway in scholarship is grounded in the civilizational paradigm and overlooks the everyday and the local in favor of the monumental.

This session aims to respond to the recent interest of emerging scholars in offering alternative narratives that shed light on the possibilities of everyday life. It considers the everyday as an analytical framework to trace substantial transformations in the social and political order and their implications on the built environment. This investigation offers an opportunity to delve into the transition of Islamic architecture and urbanism to the modern era by looking at everyday practices beyond Orientalist and essentialist perspectives.

Through interdisciplinary research and examination of rituals, practices, and social dynamics within Islamic architecture, this session aims to deepen our understanding of the lived experiences of individuals and communities across time and space. Session organizers welcome papers that explore the profound connection between everyday life and Islamic architecture through case studies and theoretical analyses.



Expanding the Practice of Research: Transdisciplinarity in Art and Art History
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: Remotely
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Committee on Research and Scholarship
Emily Walz, New York Public Library


Panel Overview:

The academic study and practice of art is an ever-evolving landscape that includes a diverse constellation of stakeholders and institutional roles, including artists, art historians, curators, critics, archivists, librarians, and others. These different roles have practices, aptitudes and affordances that contribute to our field in complex ways. They respond to and are shaped by the shifts within an expanding definition of art and the methodologies we employ. This panel aims to explore projects that utilize a wide range of research methodologies and scholarly praxes from those who represent different roles in art scholarship or identify in hybrid capacities. How can we expand our understanding of research and scholarship beyond the academic journal article or scholarly publication? In what ways is research conducted in our field that manifests itself in methods and outcomes that are unique to our field? Abstracts are welcome from all historical periods, disciplines, and perspectives. We invite papers that critically engage with the following themes:

Topics of Interest:

  • Decolonial Methodologies
  • Feminist Methodologies
  • Area Studies and Diverse Methodologies
  • Research-Based Studio Art Praxes
  • Exhibition and Art Market Scholarship
  • Digital Humanities and Artificial Intelligence
  • Critical Knowledge Organization

Submission Guidelines:

We welcome submissions of original research addressing the aforementioned topics or related areas. Submissions should adhere to the following guidelines:

  • Abstract: Please submit an abstract of 250-300 words.
  • Keywords: Include a list of no more than five keywords.
  • Author Information: Provide a resume and brief author bio (100 words) along with your affiliation and contact details.


Gender, Sexuality, and Non-Pristine Nature in Northern European Art and Material Culture, ca. 1350 -1750
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Historians of Netherlandish Art
Anna-Claire Powell Stinebring, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Sarah Walsh Mallory, The Morgan Library & Museum


How might waste studies (or discard studies), as an emerging strain within eco-critical methodologies, be put into productive conversation with (eco)feminist and queer theory? Such a question is apt in the context of early modern northern European art and material culture, born from an age in which the adage “cleanliness is next to godliness” had a particular resonance: close observation of nature was for artists a spiritual practice, which in turn spurred them to explore new methods for depicting their world, including mundane or unseemly details. This panel will examine notions of gender, sexuality, and non-pristine nature to shed new light on the construction—or playfully subversive deconstruction—of normative social hierarchies in early modern Northern European art and material culture. We build on the work of Mary Douglas, Donna Haraway, Carolyn Merchant and on recent scholarship, including: Francesca Borgo and Ruth Ezra (Wastework conference and edited volume); Emma Capron (The Ugly Duchess: Beauty and Satire in the Renaissance); Lauren Jacobi and Daniel Zolli (Contamination and Purity in Early Modern Art and Architecture); and Vittoria Di Palma (Wastelands: A History). Relevant topics include: gender in depictions of purity and contamination; wastelands; urban or domestic environments; purity in the colonial context; and contemporary curatorial responses. We welcome papers on all artforms and material culture produced in, or in connection with, the Northern Netherlands, Southern Netherlands, or Germany between the l4th and 18th centuries. Please send a proposal and CV to Sarah Mallory (smallory@themorgan.org) and Anna-Claire Stinebring (Anna-Claire.Stinebring@metmuseum.org) by August 29th.


Goddess Redux: Feminism and Spirituality in Contemporary Art
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: The Feminist Art Project
Kathleen M. Wentrack, Queensborough Community College, City University of New York and Connie Tell, The Feminist Art Project


In a 1988 lecture, Mary Beth Edelson stated, “Goddess was always a metaphor for me for radical change and change of consciousness and for challenging the daily experience of what is thought of as acceptable social codes while opening other realms of experience.” Edelson was indicative of 1960s and 1970s feminist artists who looked to ancient matriarchal cultures and goddess imagery as alternative symbols and mythological frameworks to challenge and undermine patriarchal systems of oppression. By the 1980s this work was denounced and labeled essentialist. The aughts began a series of survey exhibitions on feminist art which included a renewed appreciation and deeper analysis of the complexity of this work and exposed these artists to a younger generation who took the concept of the goddess and spirituality in new directions. This is evidenced in several recent exhibitions such as The Female Side of God (Frankfurt, 2020), Feminine Power: The Divine to the Demonic (London, 2022), and The Goddess, the Deity, the Cyborg (Cambridge, 2024). What is striking about this newer work is the breadth of examination of ideas of spirituality in artistic expression that includes a diversity of goddess references, transcultural goddesses, figures of power both benevolent and destructive, gender fluid deities, and transformational rituals of pleasure and healing. This panel seeks proposals that investigate new manifestations of goddesses and spirituality in contemporary art with a special consideration given to strategies that subvert constructs of power.


Haptic Histories: The Politics of Paper & Its Industrial Entanglements
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Association of Print Scholars
Aleisha Elizabeth Barton, University of Minnesota and Shane Morrissy, Duke University


Artists, designers, and manufacturers have long paid sustained attention to the materiality of the printed objects they produce—but how are these decisions experienced by consumers? This session examines how haptic engagements with print ephemera have shaped everyday life within and between cultures from the Industrial Revolution to the present. Expanding on foundational theories, such as Marshall McLuhan’s “medium is the message,” this session explores how tactile experiences of print media inform our habits and transform our perceptions, bridging the intersection of materiality and consumption. Recent work, including Jennifer Roberts’s synthesis of printmaking processes, Christina Michelon’s analysis of Victorian valentines and the subjectivity of touch, and Ulrich Lehmann’s discussion of wallpaper’s revolutionary politics, helps us reconceptualize the ways in which political meaning is embedded into our physical relationship with print media. In particular, this panel seeks to uncover how material supports produce outlets for structural and institutional power to flow and take hold. Panelists may consider a wide range of ephemera, such as handbills, chapbooks, maps, trade cards, broadsheets, periodicals, photographs, postcards, posters, and zines. This session seeks papers that, for example: theorize how materiality shapes social and political histories, highlight overlooked narratives generated through hands-on encounters, and/or study the social significance of characteristics such as weight, surface, and quantity. Papers that illuminate new readings of print ephemera when reconsidered through the lens of the object’s concrete materiality (whether individual or serial) are encouraged, especially as they pertain to marginalized makers and mediums underrepresented in existing scholarship.


How Has Decolonizing Art History Worked for You?
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: Remotely
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Art Historians of Southern California
Meggie Morris, San Diego Miramar College


The Art Historians of Southern California (AHSC) invite proposals for presentations that answer the question, "How has decolonizing art history worked for you?" We seek art professionals, practicing artists, students, scholars, museum educators, curators, and all others working in the field of the arts to share their recent experiences and efforts to decolonize art history. A very popular pursuit in today's world, the act of decolonizing art history can take a wide array of forms, some perhaps more successful than others. We seek to understand some of the myriad tactics, approaches, attitudes, and general ideas that those working in the arts have taken in recent years to tackle this pressing topic. What does decolonizing art history mean to you, and what shape has it taken in your personal and/or professional practice? What recommendations do you have for others interested in this effort, and what successes and drawbacks have you faced in recent efforts to decolonize art history for modern audiences today?


Icons of the Midwest: Engaging and Examining Collections
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Midwest Art History Society
Erica Warren


What is an “icon”? How might the “icon’s” conceptual elasticity provide a way for reframing scholarly approaches to interpreting objects in museum collections? This session, sponsored by the Midwest Art History Society, invites papers that consider these questions with a focus on Midwest collections (with Midwest defined as broadly as possible). Papers might examine the notion of the “icon” in the context of collection reinstallations, recent acquisitions, collaborative projects and programs, as well as institutional reorganizations and commitments to diversity, equity, access, and inclusion. What is the impact of these icon-based endeavors? How do the layered meanings/definitions of “icon” allow for a critical interrogation of its conceptual prominence in driving art historical research and other scholarly endeavors? MAHS welcomes scholars to consider this invitation and suggest other ways of seeing the “icon” as well.


Innovation by Necessity: Problem Solvers and Museum Futures
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: Remotely
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Museum Committee
Kari Samantha Sigmon and Martina Tanga, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston


In recent years, museums have received pushback regarding low wages, stagnant policies, and exclusionary practices, and have seen an uptick in both professionals leaving the field and collective labor movements. These issues now cause us to envision new strategies that address the structure of these institutions themselves. The multiple and often overlapping challenges–economic, social, organizational, and climate-related—facing the arts and cultural field have resulted in system change experiments and organization-specific innovations. While these shifts are often driven by testing circumstances, the creative opportunities for future museums are enormous.

This session seeks to explore and highlight the work of the problem-solvers who are tackling these concerns and shaping what critical theories, practices, procedures, and approaches are necessary and effective to enact for lasting, more equitable institutions. The CAA Museum Committee invites case studies and presentations on these issues by exploring systems change, internal reorganization, alternative funding models, sustainable practices, labor and compensation, careers and mentorship, and internal or external collaborations. This panel will focus on sharing research, case studies, actionable strategies, and needed reflections from many facets and viewpoints that can translate across the museum field.



Is there anybody out there? UFOs, UAPs, and American Art
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Association of Historians of American Art
Robert Cozzolino


In 2017, Leslie Kean reported in the New York Times that the U.S. government has taken U.F.O.s. seriously for decades. Resembling something out of “The X-Files,” her article, “Glowing Auras and ‘Black Money’: The Pentagon’s Mysterious U.F.O. Program,” was the first of several intelligence disclosures, rekindling the public’s interest in otherworldly technology and beings. Kean’s article appeared seventy years after the famous “Roswell incident.” Between those two events, American culture has been rife with art and imagery about U.F.O.s. This session examines artistic responses to Ufology. Papers should center the perspective and interpretations of “experiencers” – makers who believed that they or others had first-hand encounters. How did they translate encounters with a creature, being, intelligence, or technology that derived from beyond Earth? What does renewed interest in U.F.O.s say about our relationship to the planet’s ecological crisis; what does it say about our trust in or fear of technology or government? How have these concerns shifted over the past eighty years? A vast and growing Ufology literature in the humanities is full of interdisciplinary convergences. Art history has barely scratched the surface. Scholars such as Jeffrey Kripal have led the way, stewarding the Archives of the Impossible at Rice University, a center for studying this phenomena. Possible artists/subjects: Macena Barton, Peter Charlie Besharo, Rev. Howard Finster, Budd Hopkins, Mike Kelley, Paul Laffoley, John McCracken, Howardena Pindell, Sun Ra, Prophet Royal Robertson, Diego Romero, Ionel Talpazan; Indigenous nations long engaging this subject; ex-voto imagery that include U.F.O.s and extraterrestrial encounters.


Learning and Unlearning Photography
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: The Photography Network
Brendan Fay, Eastern Michigan University


In 1961, Aperture magazine heralded “the workshop idea in photography” as a locus of emerging ideas in visual education. There, Minor White sketched an ideal structured around intimate situations and interpersonal relationships, fueled by the recognition that teachers might learn from and alongside their students. Recent projects and histories have celebrated the proliferation of such models, from the Kamoinge Workshop to the Feminist Photography Ovulars, but also their seeming antitheses—above all the founding of Society for Photographic Education and the widespread professionalization of photographic instruction. Along this spectrum from informal to formal instruction, the sites, mechanisms and objectives of photographic teaching and learning can be hard to keep separate. During the 1960s, for example, White was cautious in disclosing that his private workshops were “more periods of awakening than photography,” but by the 1970s such awakening was the public face of his university teaching. The subsequent decades might be framed by Allan Sekula’s certainty that “school is a factory” alongside Carmen Winant’s hope that photography might yet “teach us how to live.”

This panel examines photographic education (and un-education) as a nexus for larger questions about teaching and learning, seeking to juxtapose the formal with the informal, the institutional with the extra- or anti-institutional, the problem of how to learn photography with the question of what else one might learn through photography. Contributions from all fields/practices, and concerning all geographic regions and modern/contemporary moments, are welcome.



Narratives of Exile, Migration, and Movement in Contemporary Art
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Society of Contemporary Art Historians
Ms. Sarah Kleinman, PhD, Virginia Commonwealth University


In his 2011 essay “The Migrant’s Time,” Ranajit Guha casts diaspora as a temporal transgression, resulting in displacement and a rupture from shared pasts. This session invites papers that examine the ways in which art and curatorial practices intersect with experiences of displacement, migration, and cultural hybridity in contemporary art. Possible topics include:

  • How have arts practitioners represented narratives of exile and displacement? What visual languages and narratives emerge from experiences of forced migration and diaspora? How do these representations challenge dominant narratives of place and belonging?

  • How have artists navigated issues of identity in the context of migration and movement? How do their works reflect the complexities of cultural hybridity, diasporic identities, and the politics of belonging?

  • How do material choices and artistic processes intersect with memories of displacement and migration? How have artists engaged with objects, textures, and archival materials to evoke personal and collective histories of migration and exile?

  • How have curators engaged with narratives of migration, exile, and (post)colonial histories in exhibition-making? How have recent exhibitions served as sites of critical inquiry?

  • How have diasporic artistic practices challenged dominant narratives of migration, displacement, and colonial legacies? How have arts practitioners mobilized art as a tool for resistance, solidarity, and social change?

This session aims to critically examine narratives of exile, migration, and movement within the broader context of contemporary art and visual culture. We particularly encourage submissions from emerging scholars, curators, and artists.



New Directions in British Art and Architectural History
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Historians of British Art
Dr. Monica Anke Hahn and Laurel Peterson, Yale Center for British Art


New Directions in British Art and Architectural History

The study and practice of art history in the academy and in in the museum has changed substantially in the last five years. This call invites scholars, researchers, curators, and practitioners to present their work on innovative approaches, emerging themes, and unexplored avenues in the study of British art and architectural history. We define “Britain” and “British art” broadly, and welcome presentations on a diverse range of topics including, but not limited to:

  • Reevaluations of overlooked or underrepresented artists, architects, styles, and movements.
  • Revised interpretations of established narratives and historical perspectives.
  • Explorations of transnational connections and global exchanges shaping British artistic and architectural practices.
  • Examinations of the intersections between British art and architecture and issues of identity, memory, and tradition.
  • New curatorial approaches and interventions
  • Applications of innovative methodologies, including digital humanities, GIS mapping, and material analysis.

Especially encouraged are projects with interdisciplinary approaches, and those that consider wide geographical, social, and racial contexts. Proposals from scholars in and outside of academia, and at any stage in their programs or careers are welcome.



Next Now: Studio Art Foundations
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Foundations in Art: Theory and Education
Heidi C. Hogden, Foundations In Art: Theory & Ed (F.A.T.E.) and Meredith Starr, SUNY Suffolk County Community College


Following up on the 2025 FATE Conference, this session targets how we will challenge the established structures and assumptions that form our current understanding of what a foundational education in the arts is supposed to be. What tools have we developed teaching in a pandemic and “post” pandemic environment to better serve how students learn NOW? How might we project reimagined structures into the future to better build the NEXT supportive, inquisitive, and inclusive educational environments?

Artists and Educators are already doing amazing work to challenge traditional/status quo thinking of Foundations. We can learn from these contemporary moments of transformation to effect wider change. What are we doing NOW that shifts, extends, and bends what it means to engage new art students in contemporary making, doing, and thinking? The NEXT NOW is an attempt to conjure, in the present, the tools our students will need to build sustainable practices in their rapidly changing worlds.



Open Session for Emerging Scholars
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Association for Latin American Art
Gina McDaniel Tarver, Texas State University-San Marcos and Luis J. Gordo Peláez, California State University, Fresno


The aim of the ALAA-sponsored open session is to provide a platform at the annual conference to highlight work produced by advanced graduate students and recent Ph.D.s who concentrate on the histories of Latin American and Latinx arts and/or visual and material cultures. Papers may focus on any region, period, or theme related to the Latin American and Latinx experience, including pre-Hispanic/ancient American art, colonial/viceregal art, the art of the long nineteenth century, modern art, and contemporary art, in any of its forms and expressive manifestations from what is today Latin America, the Caribbean, and the U.S. In reviewing submissions and selecting the papers for the session, the co-chairs will be looking for strong proposals that cover a range of subjects across each of the noted areas. Co-chairs encourage papers that address issues related to underrepresented genders, ethnic groups, and social classes.


Pacific Futurisms
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Pacific Art Association
Maggie Wander, Santa Clara University and Nicole Furtado, University of California Santa Cruz


The Pacific Arts Association Panel will explore the growing field of Pacific Futurisms. It asks what are the future aesthetic and political practices of Oceania (the Pacific Islands, Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, Papua New Guinea, and more)? The ʻōlelo noʻeau (or, Hawaiian proverbial saying), “I ka wā ma mua, I ka wā ma hope” or “the future is in the past” provides one theoretical grounding in which music, art, and activism represents an aesthetic and praxis of Pacific Futurisms. And beyond Hawaiʻi and Polynesia, the present and future are inseparable from the past. By weaving ancestral knowledges into Indigenous Pacific methods of cultural expression, this panel will engage with how artists and scholars create anti-colonial art that addresses the problems of the present and future. We are also interested in how futurism might be considered in a historical lens, for instance how artists in the 19th century imagined Hawaiʻi’s future in the face of U.S. occupation. This critical cultural and historical framework is generative for bringing into existence anti-capitalist futures that elucidate Oceanic relationality to land and people. Pacific Futurisms (Moana Futurisms, Solwara Futurisms, and more) embody the actualization of the futures we want and need, and in doing so, we realize we must first look to the past for guidance, protocols, and answers. This panel builds on the PAA Symposium that took place in Honolulu in June 2024, and invites submissions from scholars, thinkers, artists, curators, and cultural practitioners to add to this rich and timely discussion.


Personal and Global: Current Directions in Feminist Abstractionist Art
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Committee on Women in the Arts
Tanya Augsburg, PhD, San Francisco State University


Contemporary feminist abstractionist artists have been challenging prevailing and persistent histories of abstract art as non-representational art reflecting artists’ inner private selves. This panel will feature papers that survey how contemporary women and femme-identified artists are foregrounding abstraction in their work to as a means of feminist critique in addressing pressing social justice concerns and complex societal problems.

This session seeks to fill a gap in existing art historical scholarship and arts writing about recent feminist art focused on abstraction by seeking presentations privileging global or transnational connections as well as multigenerational and intersectional comparisons. It invites scholarly explorations of feminist visual art by artists of color, engagements with indigenous textile art, or those arising from the traditions of abstraction, especially from Africa, Asia, Oceania, Nordic lands, the Middle East, the Caribbean, and the Americas. It also seeks presentations about artists who have reinterpreted existing histories of abstract expressionism across mediums to address contemporary intersectional feminist issues and/or additional social justice issues such as environmental degradation and climate change from feminist perspectives.



Presenting Contemporary Art in Museums, ca. 1880-1930: Temporary Exhibitions, Institutional Networks and Collecting
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Society for the History of Collecting
Ulrike Müller, University of Antwerp and Anne Helmreich, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution


In recent historical narratives of the market for and collecting of modern and contemporary art, little attention has been given to the proliferation of temporary–often travelling–exhibitions held in museums since the late nineteenth century. These exhibitions include shows organized by institutions labelling themselves as “museums” but lacking collections, thus functioning more as “kunsthalle” (like the “Museum of French Art” in New York, established in 1911), or public galleries later rebranded as “museums” (such as the Buffalo AKG Art Museum).

This session seeks to investigate the phenomenon of temporary exhibitions of contemporary art held in museums in Europe and the Americas between approximately 1880 and 1930:

  • What role did museum exhibitions play in stimulating demand for contemporary art? What was the relationship between collecting patterns and these exhibitions?
  • How did civic and other types of public support for the arts and commercial interests interrelate (or even compete) in these initiatives?
  • Which types of artworks, genres, styles, and artists were featured in these exhibitions, and what were their intended audiences (and did they attract)?
  • What national and international networks were cultivated and developed by these practices and institutional actors? How did these museum-based initiatives compare to exhibitions and networks tied to commercial galleries, artists’ associations, etc.?

We particularly encourage case studies that reflect on the ways in which these exhibitions shaped the profiles, collections, and future development of the museums – as well as institutional relationships to this past.



Race in South Asian Art
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: American Council for Southern Asian Art
Meghaa Ballakrishnen, Johns Hopkins University and Mohit Manohar, The University of Chicago


This panel emerges from a desire to understand race in South Asian art. Race often involves circumscribing a group of people based on some physical difference, whether real or imagined, and giving that difference an ethical and hierarchical significance. Drawing on the scholarship on the artistic legacies of various racial groups, including African, Greek, Middle Eastern, and European communities in South Asia (e.g., McLeoad and Robbins, “The Image of the Black in India,” 2017), we are interested in asking whether and how such difference finds its way into representation.

How might Mauryan sculptures be reinterpreted if we knew that Greco-Roman physical features were deemed desirable at the time? Could we rewrite a history of portraiture from the perspective of African generals in the Deccan or F. N. Souza’s “Black Paintings?” How does colonialism structure and produce racial categories, and how do anticolonial and postcolonial aesthetic theories reproduce or challenge them? Does race extend our discipline to the tombs of enslaved Turks, Dravidian film and video cultures, and contemporary indigenous resistance?

We are aware that race is a fluid, difficult to describe, socially constructed, category. And yet, it is urgent to consider its workings in our scholarship and in our classrooms. We welcome proposals that discuss any aspect of South Asian art and architecture, including its diasporas, from artists, curators, critics, conservators, and scholars across the humanities and the social sciences, and especially invite conceptually innovative approaches, including those that critique our premise.



Reaching Out: An Other-Focused Academic Approach to the Visual Arts
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: SECAC
Melissa Geiger


Art faculty and art educators are exploring innovative approaches that blend skills and processes traditionally associated with visual arts with collaborative and interdisciplinary strategies often linked to design disciplines. Within contemporary studio art circles, a growing awareness is evident as faculty members expand their unique creative visions and actively involve other academics, students, and communities into their artistic practices. Our focus is on artist practitioners serving within academic institutions, who are developing innovative ways to extend their artistic endeavors into practice-based research and creative activities involving unique collaborations, into novel teaching models, and into visionary outreach efforts for the greater good. By embracing diverse perspectives and harmonizing them with their individual artistic visions, art faculty engage in fresh and empathetic ways of reimagining the discipline. How can academic artistic inquiry expand beyond personal creativity? What role do interdisciplinary collaborations play in fostering cross-disciplinary artistic practices? What are some ways to use new technologies towards enhancing collaborative teaching and research in the arts? How can teaching artists involve themselves and their classes in community outreach and engagement efforts to create meaningful and impactful experiences of art? How can teaching artists contribute to educating a broader audience a broader audience on the value of art in improving people’s quality of life and personal growth? We welcome a wide range of viewpoints on this session’s theme.


Reconsidering Religion in Modern and Contemporary Art: Methods and Approaches
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Association of Scholars of Christianity in the History of Art
Linda H. Stratford, Asbury University and Hannah Hempstead


While religious ideas and commitments inform much of modern and contemporary art-making, such sensibilities remain stubbornly under-explored within serious scholarly and art-critical writing. Such hermeneutic reticence is, however, provokingly challenged in recent publications such as Jonathan Anderson, The (In)visibilities of Religion in Contemporary Art (Notre Dame, 2025); Erika Doss, Spiritual Moderns (University of Chicago, 2023); and Bernier and Smith, eds., Religion and Contemporary Art: A Curious Accord (Routledge, 2023).

What opportunities, strategies, and methodologies are available to cultivate serious writing that responsibly engages with religious sensibility in contemporary art history? How might we, as chroniclers and interpreters of modern and contemporary art, continue to re-think and re-write a more complete, nuanced story?

This session seeks papers and presentations that consider the current 'state of the field' of art and religion, proposing or engaging methodological approaches that are rigorous enough to provoke and further current scholarly discourse. Special interest will be given to submissions demonstrating a commitment to cultivating sophisticated and theoretically engaged art writing that uncovers religious and spiritual sensibilities in modern and contemporary art.

Case studies; artist incubators; methodologies; theoretical means of interpretation and other means of diversifying and retooling the field of art writing are welcomed.



Rethinking the Theory and Methods Art History Course
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Northern California Art Historians
Rachel Miller and Dr. Mya B. Dosch


For years, many art historians have been engaged in a discipline-wide effort to redesign the survey course by opening the traditional canon to more diverse artists and artworks, while also proposing new teaching methods that are more inclusive and engaging. However, fewer disciplinary discussions have reassessed another important course – the theory and methods course. Usually offered in the final year of an undergraduate degree or at the beginning of an MA/PhD program, the theory and methods course traditionally introduces students to “classic” texts (Vasari, Panofsky, Greenberg, etc) that often end up reinforcing the Western narratives that our newly decolonized survey courses were carefully designed to break down. These courses aim to teach the methods of art history, but it can be unclear to students how these texts can be applied to their research, especially on topics from outside of the Western canon. This panel invites speakers to address how they have re-envisioned methods courses and their place in art history curricula. Questions of interest include, but are not limited to: How can we decolonize the content of methods and theory courses? What theoretical and historiographic texts are actually useful to students as they form nascent research agendas? How can students be taught the skills necessary to comprehend difficult theoretical texts and then apply them to their own work? Can we envision a version of the methods and theory course that is useful to all art history students, not just those who plan to go on to graduate study?


Sovereignty, Art, and its Histories
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: National Committee for History of Art
C. Jean Campbell, Emory University and Caroline Fowler, Clark Art Institute


In this inaugural session of four leading up to CIHA Washington DC 2028, the National Committee for the History of Art (NCHA) invites proposals for papers reflecting on the question of “sovereignty” and considering how artists, patrons, art institutions, and audiences have engaged, debated, or contested the concept and practices of sovereignty. We open with two broad questions: firstly, how issues of sovereignty, personal and institutional, have been involved in the exploration of the philosophies, politics, and knowledge-structures that have been central to writing about the production of art in all media and across time; and second, how the realm of art production structures ideas like that of territory, borders, belonging, personhood, bare life, Indigeneity, exclusion, and migrancy.


Spectacles of Nationhood: World's Fairs and Italian Identity Formation
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Italian Art Society
Lucia Colombari, University of Oklahoma


Throughout history, World’s Fairs have functioned as pivotal platforms for nations to showcase their cultural achievements, technological advancements, and ideological frameworks. This panel delves into the intricate dynamics between these expansive events and the process of nation-building in Italy. Situated at the crossroads between monumentality and modernity, World’s Fairs have provided Italy with a platform to (re)shape and assert its political and cultural identity following the unification in 1861, while fostering international relations and galvanizing Italian diasporic communities. Italy’s participation has often aimed to juxtapose its storied Renaissance and classical heritage with contemporary achievements and economic prowess, pursuing a complex negotiation between historical legacy and modernist trends. In turn, domestic socio-cultural shifts and international political turmoil paralleling specific expositions shaped the planning of Italian pavilions and the thematic exhibits.

Central inquiries of this panel encompass Italy’s strategic utilization of art, architecture, and exhibitionary practices, elucidating their contributions to shaping public perceptions and narratives surrounding its national character. Furthermore, this investigation explores the intricate entwinement of politics and art in cultivating and projecting national identity, illuminating the symbiotic relationship between socio-political agendas and aesthetic representations within the context of World’s Fairs.



Taking and Making: Artistic Reckonings with Cultural Property Theft in the Long Nineteenth Century
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Association of Historians of 19th-Century Art
Nancy Karrels, Independent Scholar and Curator


The nineteenth century witnessed a plethora of incidents of cultural property theft accompanied by coercion and violence and often driven by imperial and colonial agendas. From the notorious spoliation of Beijing’s Old Summer Palace during the Opium Wars to the seizure of sacred Native American artifacts under the guise of scientific inquiry, these acts of looting left communities grappling with profound cultural losses that still reverberate today.

This panel explores the complex dynamics of artistic exchange and expression engendered by these traumatic events. Drawing inspiration from Bénédicte Savoy’s transnational approach to the cultural exchanges that resulted from the French spoliation of Germanic princely collections in post-Revolutionary Europe, we aim to investigate the ways in which forcible transfers of cultural patrimony globally catalyzed shifts in artistic value and meaning during the long nineteenth century, and how these contentious processes sparked cross-cultural discourse and innovative avenues of creative expression among artists directly impacted by or complicit in them. From the interplay between looting and artistic production to the evolution of techniques and styles in the aftermath of plunder, we encourage contributions from diverse cultural perspectives and methodological approaches.

Proposals are open to all, but once accepted, presenters will need to update their memberships in both CAA and AHNCA by the time of the conference.



The Art of Collaboration in the Long Eighteenth Century
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Historians of Eighteenth-Century Art and Architecture
Yasemin Diba Altun, Duke University and Tori Champion, University of St Andrews


The eighteenth century is an era known for its joint ventures, from sweeping publications like the Encyclopédie to crowd-sourcing spaces like the Enlightenment salon. This panel invites papers that consider the group dynamics and agencies that shaped the production, distribution, and consumption of visual and material art and culture during the long eighteenth century (ca. 1688-1815). How did eighteenth-century makers and their art worlds define “collaboration”? Scholars have noted that this term (at least in relation to artmaking) did not arise until the nineteenth century. What then were earlier vocabularies and discourses used to characterize a shared creative process and its participants? Papers could engage with conventional hierarchies of fine and craft arts. They could examine divisions of labor within academic, guild, domestic, and other contexts of production, both local and global. Particularly welcome are contributions that take up the politics and (in)visibilities of collaboration: how has credit been attributed to artworks produced by more than one individual? Whose names have or have not been ascribed to such works, for instance when displayed in exhibitions, sold on the art market, or described in critical writings? How do modern and more recent ideas of authorship fit or conflict with the eighteenth-century realities of artistic practice, which often involved multiple people working at different sites and stages, whether in concert or competition, to realize products of visual and material culture? Ultimately, this panel seeks contributions that challenge or complicate lingering norms of individual—relatedly, male and white—authorship in eighteenth-century art history.


The Case for Working Together, Collaborating Together
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Community College Professors of Art and Art History
Prof. Susan M. Altman, MFA, Middlesex College and Dr. Monica Anke Hahn


In the past few years, our students have become increasingly accustomed to working in isolation. In studio courses and art history classes they often work separately without meaningful interaction with one another. However, studies consistently show that collaboration in student projects offers numerous benefits. It enhances learning outcomes, promotes critical thinking skills, and fosters a sense of community among students. We seek proposals that explore the benefits of collaborative learning in art education, addressing the following questions: How can we facilitate collaboration between students in studio and art history courses? What strategies can educators employ to bridge the gap between disciplines and encourage interdisciplinary collaboration? In what ways have you developed partnerships with external organizations, communities, or professionals to enrich students' learning experiences? We welcome submissions that showcase successful collaborations, whether they involve classroom projects, departmental initiatives, or partnerships beyond academia. Proposals should demonstrate how these collaborations enhance student learning, promote critical thinking, and offer unique insights into course content.


The Form of the Thing: Word and Image and the Scholar
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: International Association of Word and Image Studies
Tilo Reifenstein


The complexities and contingent nature of the word-and-image relations of artistic and literary practices are frequent subjects of (inter)disciplinary inquiry. Yet, the scholarship responding to such works rarely explores and investigates its own potential as and participation in verbo-visual productions. On the contrary, it asserts a classificatory difference between scholarly and creative ‘uses’ of words and pictures. The formality of scholarship submits, at least tacitly, to a formless neutrality of language and images whose workings may be contained. Yet, the proximity or overlap of the work of artists and scholars is not only integral to the forty-year history of artistic research within art schools, but has also been explored theoretically within different disciplinary settings. Hence, Hayden White lamented the historian’s ‘lack of linguistic self-consciousness’ (1978) if they failed to acknowledge the similarity between their work and the poet’s. Jaś Elsner, similarly, planted art-historical practice firmly in the purview of poetry, literature or fiction, though be it ‘fiction with footnotes’ (2010). More broadly, Saidiya Hartman (2008) calls for ‘critical fabulation’ to write against the limitations of existing histories.

The session seeks to explore scholarly work as a word-image practice that necessarily needs to negotiate the boundaries of visual and verbal production rather than, by default, appeal to formal conventions. Through case studies—perhaps of scholarship disguised as artist’s books, literary essays, experimental writing or conventional examples—or theoretical approaches, the imbrications of the form of scholarly practice with its content, as well as its methodological and ethical implications will come into focus.



The Material Text in Latin America: Local Traditions and Intercultural Dialogue
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Bibliographical Society of America
Jeanne-Marie Musto


The goal of this session is to explore textual materials that have originated or been adapted for use in one or more Latin American cultures. The interplay between cultures, including relationships between different Latin American cultures or between Latin American and other cultures, will be a particular focus. Papers that address any period up to 1914, including pre-contact materials and their post-contact transformations, will be prioritized. A variety of media will be considered, including painted pottery, carved stone, molded stucco, coins and other metalwork, and manuscripts or printed materials. Examples include the use and reuse of items bearing Indigenous or European scripts; the reinterpretation of imagery from elsewhere to illustrate Latin American texts; the early European historiography of Indigenous Latin American ideographs and pictographs. While attending to the specificity of local traditions, the session will consider the significance of these artifacts in intercultural and historiographic perspective. The geographical definition of “Latin America” is open.


The Ongoing Life of Refuse in Art
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works
Rebecca Anne Rushfield


Over the past hundred years artists have included materials in their work that evidence wear, damage, abuse and decay. Some of these elements were obviously scavenged from waste baskets, the streets, garbage bins and dumps. With a few notable exceptions, These artworks have entered public and private collections with little discussion of the challenges they present to traditional standards of care or conservation, or the implications that decisions about care might have on a work's value. One exception is Zoe Leonard's “Strange Fruit”. An act of mourning for the artist's friends and colleagues lost to AIDS, it consists of the empty skins of 295 bananas, oranges, grapefruit, lemons and avocados which Leonard stitched shut with thread, buttons and zippers. When the Philadelphia Museum of Art acquired “Strange Fruit” in 1998, it agreed to allow the work to decay naturally and also agreed to maintain contact with the artist, with the understanding that some day they might consider it no longer exhibit-able. But what about the many artworks for which no such agreements exist? What is appropriate care for works whose abject materials are integral to their content? Would attempts to remove signs of decay or arrest its progress be proper care, or would they compromise the artwork's intent and distort its history? We encourage contributions from artists, art historians, curators and others who have faced such questions.


The Visual Culture of Festivals in Germany, Scandinavia, and Central Europe
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Historians of German, Scandinavian, and Central European Art and Architecture
Michelle Oing


Mikhail Bakhtin’s foundational work on carnival has inspired countless studies on festivals around the world, and the idea of the world turned upside down. Though Bakhtin’s focus was on literature, much subsequent work on festivals has been produced by anthropologists, social historians, and theater historians, for whom the inversion of carnival provides a useful framework to consider myriad themes (social hierarchy, humor, reform, etc.).

But what makes a festival a festival? What is often most striking is their rich visual culture. In this panel we are interested in the idea of the festival broadly defined: gatherings religious or secular, parades, protests, organized events and spontaneous celebrations or revolts. From the elaborate ephemeral architecture of early modern royal entries, to Midsummer celebrations involving maypoles and bonfires, and the Krampusnacht parades of Austria and Central Europe, these festivals make full use of the visual impact of masks, puppets, floats, costumes, automata, and the manipulation of architectural and/or natural spaces. Ephemeral live events, records of festivals also often survive only in visual form, whether in photography, painting, engraving, or other forms of visual record-keeping. This panel seeks papers that consider the highly visual and spatial aspects of the festival in Germany, Scandinavia, and Central Europe through an art historical lens.

We welcome submissions that blend art historical and other theoretical approaches in order to explore what the tools of art history can bring to the study of the festivals from this region, from antiquity to the present.



This Old Text and Taxonomy: Renovating Art Historical Documentation
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Catalogue Raisonné Scholars Association
Abigael MacGibeny, Joan Mitchell Catalogue Raisonné


Certain forms of art historical documentation, such as catalogues raisonnés, have become authoritative statements of an artist’s relation to the canon, with patterns and habits that have evolved regarding descriptive terms, classifications, and language. Yet traditional publication formats and controlled vocabularies don’t always accommodate content that requires reinterpretation in light of current developments in art history and society itself.

The digital turn presents challenges and opportunities: how can we include artists, media, ways of working that don’t fit rubrics established long ago? How can we bridge the past to the present, including contextualizing language and images that have different and sometimes troubling meanings today? How can we update the ways in which we present data while preserving the intent of traditional forms of documentation? How can these changes in turn provide new data, ideas, and possibilities to art history and adjacent fields?

This panel seeks to reveal ways in which art historians, scholars of digital art history, archivists, catalogue raisonné professionals, and other practitioners are renovating long-standing structures and recasting controlled vocabularies to account even more accurately for the work of individual artists and enrich the contributions made by art historical documentation. Stories and analyses of how content is being reexamined as well as creative publication choices—including catalogues raisonnés among other forms of monographic art historical study—are welcome.



Unboxing the Long Eighteenth Century
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: American Society for 18th Century Studies
Dani Rebecca Ezor, Kenyon College and Jennifer G. Germann


Boxes are objects which at once contain and extend their makers’ and users’ contact with the world. Then as now, they traveled the globe, moving between cultures and amongst sellers, consumers, and collectors. With online shopping and shipping, they have proliferated as symbols of consumerism, as fodder for YouTube and TikTok videos, and as useful nuisances, littering our landscapes. They have not, however, claimed the same space in our scholarly studies. Usually an afterthought or even discarded entirely, boxes could be luxury goods themselves, made by skilled craftspersons with significant care and attention to detail. Boxes contain, store, hide, protect, wrap, package, present, and encase, but they can also reveal, expose, manifest, exhibit, and even release. Here we turn attention to the box as a signifier and site of meaning. As noted in the Encyclopédie, “The number of assemblages that can be called a box is infinite.” (“Le nombre des assemblages auxquels on donne le nom de boîte est infini.”)

This panel invites papers that explore boxes of all kinds, including but not limited to boxes for artist’s materials; snuff boxes; powder boxes; mouche boxes; nécessaires; etuis; tea or coffee canisters; specimen boxes; trunks; coffers; caskets; and cases; as well as their representation. These objects raise issues related to interiority and exteriority, storage and display, the hidden and the revealed. Global topics from the 17th through the early 19th century that address labor, performance, the senses, empire, materiality, gender, race, and other avenues of exploration are welcome.


Vantage Point: CAA Services to Artists Committee Exhibition
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Services to Artists Committee
Ms. Elyse Longair, Chair, Services to Artists Committee, CAA


The CAA Services to Artists Committee is accepting submissions for Vantage Point, a photo-based exhibition.

At the most basic level, a photograph is a moment captured from a specific vantage point, a representation, not simply re-presenting ‘the real’ but especially in contemporary culture, creating our sense of reality. As Susan Sontag writes, “photographed images do not seem to be statements about the world so much as pieces of it, miniatures of reality” (4). Vantage Point seeks to highlight artists who push the boundaries of what an image is, who confront anticipated vantage points and in turn challenge viewers to consider the complexities of perception and representation. Both emerging and established artists working in any photo-based or screen based medium (including digital, film, video, or alternative photo processing) are welcome to apply.

Please combine into one pdf:

  • Artist Statement (max 200 words)
  • Bio (max 150 words)
  • Curriculum Vitae
  • Website
  • Corresponding Image List: image number, title, medium, dimension, and date
  • Handling, framing and hanging descriptions
  • Accessibility requirements

The portfolio of 10 -15 jpeg images should be uploaded

  • Each image must be sized to 1M
  • Title each image: Last name_Title_Medium_Dimensions_Date

Please Note: Entry is free however, all accepted all artists must become members of CAA. If a submission is selected, artists are responsible for arranging timely delivery and pickup of artwork in NYC at their own expense. All work must be ready to be hung and framing of the work needs to be agreed upon in conversation with the curator.



WOMEN ART DEALERS AND COLLECTORS PROMOTING NON-WESTERN ARTS: THE CASE OF PRE-COLUMBIAN ART AND THE INDIGENOUS ARTS OF NORTH AMERICA
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: The International Art Market Studies Association
Caterina Toschi


This session pertains to WADDA | Women Art Dealers Digital Archives and focuses on one of WADDA’s goals, which is to bring attention to women gallerists who supported artists who may have been marginalized because of the gender or ethnic identity and who practiced in under-studied regions of the art market.

Our call invites scholars who work on women art dealers and women art collectors to propose papers, which explore the theme of the promotion of non-European arts from two angles. On the one hand, we are interested in proposals that will analyze the promotion and the development of the market for Pre-Columbian Art and the Indigenous Arts of North America, as well as the flourishing of the private collecting of these artifacts. On the other hand, we seek contributions about women gallerists or women collectors who supported or still support modern and contemporary artists who were/are either located outside main art centers or which art practice was/is grounded conceptually as well as aesthetically in these ancient cultures.

The session aims to highlight the marketing strategy, the exhibitions history and the editorial projects which support the advocacy of the women gallerists and well as the art collecting choices and the international networks these women created.

To submit a paper, please send an abstract (250 words), title, and a short biography in English to toschi@unistrasi.it, with the subject line “WADDA session at CAA” by August 30, 2024.

Authors will be notified of acceptance by September 16, 2024.



What Is Public Art For?
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: Public Art Dialogue
DeWitt A. Godfrey, Colgate University and Rachel Boate, Colgate University, Department of Art & Art History


The definitions, stakes, forms, practices, and funding of public art have shifted radically since the establishment of the Federal Art-in-Architecture program in 1962 and the National Endowment for the Arts first public art commission in 1967. The decade-long controversy surrounding Richard Serra’s Tilted Arc catalyzed a populist turn, sparking an ongoing debate about public art’s responsibility to the communities that inhabit public space. It was out of this same ethos in the late 1980s that Patricia Phillips announced the professionalization of public art, a phenomenon that has only grown as the lines between public art, architecture, design, and advertising have progressively eroded. More recently, artists, urban planners, and bureaucrats have grappled with how to center historically marginalized voices in public space, while public space itself has increasingly broached the virtual realm, inciting new questions about what roles art in public spaces can or should perform. In tune with the discursive nature of public art—a field that evades clearcut objectives and definitions— we invite papers that address the broad question: what is public art for? What purposes and audiences can or should public art serve? What forms can or should art in public spaces take? We seek proposals from art historians, artists, designers, architects, curators, fabricators, administrators, etc. whose work aims to interrogate the underlying motivations, goals, and values that inform the creation and reception of art in public space from the 1960s to the present day.


Women Artists in Modern Movements
Abstract Submissions Closed
Session will convene: On location
Affiliated Society or Committee Name: William Morris Society in the United States
Lauren McCardel, Ursinus College--Berman Museum of Art


This interdisciplinary session explores the roles of women artists/art workers in modern movements of all kinds—artistic, social, political, and technological. It seeks to illuminate women’s nuanced and multifaceted contributions to the various ideologies and cultural shifts these movements spurred around the world. From the suffrage movement to the Harlem Renaissance, from the labor movements of the nineteenth century to contemporary environmental activism, women in art and craft have played pivotal roles in bringing about change. Their creative endeavors, organizational efforts, and intellectual contributions were instrumental in shaping the aesthetic, social, and political landscape of their time. We welcome submissions that address a wide array of geographic regions, contexts, and periods. Potential topics may include but are not limited to: the influence of women artists on avant-garde movements; feminist art practices and activism; women's contributions to cultural exchange and cross-cultural dialogue; intersectionality in women’s art movements; rediscovery and reevaluation of overlooked women artists; and the role of women in shaping art education and institutions.

Financial support may be available from the William Morris Society in the United States for a speaker without institutional funding. If you would like to be considered for funding, please notify the session chair when you submit your paper proposal.