The National International: Superiority Narratives in Central European Art

Since their emergence in mid/late-nineteenth century, national art histories have always existed in the space of dialectical tension with their international counterpart. This presentation will look at Central European narratives of national artistic pride through three temporal case studies: First, the presence of national art from the newly independent Central European nations in the United States post-1918, specifically: the monumental "Slavic Epic" painting series by Alfons Mucha displayed at the Brooklyn Musuem in 1921. Second, the Cold War-era dreams of international relevance by artists from communist Poland, still grounded (as I will argue) in the Stalinist-era paradigms of "art national in content." And, third, the contemporary, 2020s phantasms of national glory propelled by conservative governments and their cultural politics in Hungary.