Kosmala, Katarzyna, Post Doc

By Katherine Harrison on 21 May | 0 comments

GEXcel project: Do not die for love! Visual accounts of domestic violence: On seeing and noticing

This research project, enveloped in feminist aesthetics addresses invisibility surrounding violence in the context of domestic and/or sex-related abuse while simultaneously engages in debate that contributes to deconstruction of the issues of gender inequality in the hetero-normative milieu.

The objective is to problematise a notion of abuse in domestic realms and/or relationship-related violence, drawing on its representation from the visual arts. The examples illustrating the accounts of violences that are examined in the wider context include two American-based artists: Barbara Kruger’s project Don’t Die For Love: Stop Domestic Violence organised in Glasgow in association with the Amnesty International, 2005 and Bruce Nauman’s video installations Anthro-Socio exhibited as a part of his solo exhibition at Musee d’Art Contemporain in Montreal in 2007 and his installation Violent Incident from Tate Collection.

The project focuses on the critical issues associated with the crisis of heterosexual masculinity – in particular in relation to the problematic of an increasing disconnection and fragmentation of men – linking this crisis to the problem of relational violence, its visibility, organization and perpetuated surrounding silence.

Biographical notes:

Dr Katarzyna Kosmala is Reader/Associate Professor at the Centre for Contemporary European Studies, Faculty of Business and Creative Industries, the University of the West of Scotland and a freelance art writer.
She researches and publishes internationally on aspects of the construction of gendered identity and otherness in contemporary (visual) culture, as well as on politics of representation in new media, predominantly in the context of cultural globalisation. She also researches in the arts and organization studies interface. Currently involved in the collaborative project: Sexing the Border: Gender, Art and New Media in Central and Eastern Europe. Following GEXcel visit in May and June 2009, she presented the papers ‘Representing men in their creative international careers: What do you need to give up?’ and ‘Researching relationship-based violence: On taking a visual turn’ that she will be developing within GEXcel’s Themes Two and Four. Also currently co-convenes and co-organizes the following conference streams:

Labyrinths of ‘Otherness’:  Alternative Voices, Visual Accounts and Artistic Representations of Organisational Selves, APROS, Monterrey, Mexico, December 2009

Movements, Political Organizations and Governance: Collective Creativity for/in a Sustainable World, LAEMOS: Constructing & Disrupting Social Realities, Buenos Aires, April, 2010

Bounderless Creativity in Altermodernist World: An E-merging Encounter of East & West, North & South, International Art of Management Conference, Istanbul August 2010