Apologies for cross-postings.

Southeastern College Art Conference (SECAC)
October 17-20, 2012
Durham, NC

Panel: “In Memory Of. . .:Death and Technological Afterlife”
(Joint Art History & Studio Art Session)
Deadline April 20, 2012

In the 19th century, the ghost world was “analyzed” and experienced through new technologies of photography and sound recording. More recently, scholars have used death as a metaphor for technologies. For example, in Camera Lucida, Roland Barthes equates photography’s inherent characteristic of “that-has-been” with the past and, thus, with death as he searched to reactivate his dead mother through photographs, while Laura Mulvey used the title Death 24x a Second to describe her analysis of the intersections between film, new media, and time. This panel of artists and art historians will examine contemporary ways technologies are employed with regards to life after death.

While open to discussions of any form of technology or medium, we are particularly interested in presentations that investigate newer visual and artistic forms such as photography, film, and new media. Possible topics include: contemporary art that examines issues surrounding death; ethical considerations of representing the dead or dying; transhumanism/posthumanism; the management of online presences of the deceased; contemporary forms of spirit technologies; ways visual technologies reactive, or reanimate, subjects; human relationships with the dead through visual technologies; art and mourning; and virtual headstones and memorials.

Panel co-chairs: Corey Dzenko, University of New Mexico, cjdzenko@gmail.com and Dickie Cox, Independent New Media Artist, dickiecox@gmail.com.

Submit all applications electronically by April 20, 2012. For instructions on how to submit applications and required forms, visit: http://www.secollegeart.org/annual-conference.html