During聽5-6 May 2022, the聽Aesthetica Future Now Symposium聽brings together聽key arts institutions, galleries and artists聽for discussions surrounding the most聽pressing issues from our creative industries,聽as well as聽networking and portfolio reviews. Here, we round up unmissable talks from today’s leading creatives. They will discuss myriad topics 鈥 from photography and video art to activism and history.
Who Controls History?聽
Larry Achiampong | 5 May
Larry Achiampong is an award-winning artist who employs aural and visual archives, live performance and sound to explore ideas surrounding class, heritage and memory, as well as cross-cultural and post-digital identities. He splices personal and collective archives to reveal socio-political contradictions throughout history, questioning modes of agency in the age of mass-migration and technologisation. His ongoing project,聽Relic Traveller, is a speculative piece that considers the rise of nationalism, capitalism and globalisation. Achiampong will discuss pop culture and postcolonialism.
he Power of Discomfort: Art That Shatters Stereotypes
Sutapa Biswas & Allie Biswas | 5 May
British Indian artist Sutapa Biswas has had an extensive career, from being a vital contributor to the British Black Arts Movement in the 1980s to contributing to wider conversations about identity, dislocation and belonging in the 21st聽century. Her works, spanning painting and drawing, film, digital video, performance and photography, employ 鈥渂eauty鈥 to visually disrupt, challenge and provoke the viewer, whilst engaging with questions of identity, race and gender in relation to time, space and history.
Social Documentary: People, Places, Photographs
Jamie Hawkesworth in Conversation | 5 May
Between the years of 2007 and 2020, a tumultuous period in British history which included the credit crunch, riots, Brexit and the accelerated Black Lives Matter movement, Jamie Hawkesworth set out to photograph the UK and its diverse communities, based on the sole desire to travel and see places for what they were, not what they were perceived to be. In conversation, Hawkesworth discusses the changing role of the photographer, the ethics of documentary, and how to create images without an agenda.
Constructing the Moment: A Masterclass in Photography
Hannah Starkey | 6 May
Since the late-1990s, Hannah Starkey has been dedicated to photographing women, exploring the ways they are, and have been depicted, taking cues from visual culture. Known for her cinematic mise-en-scenes, which appear as spontaneous or 鈥渇leeting鈥 moments, Starkey constructs portraits of women across a range of generations, often situated in everyday urban contexts. Here, Starkey explores shifting visual languages, and the rise of photography as the world鈥檚 most influential medium.
The Personal is Political
Poulomi Basu in Conversation with Bindi Vora聽| 5 May
Through a practice that combines photography, moving image, sound and installation world-renowned transmedia artist, photographer and activist Poulomi Basu will be in conversation with Autograph鈥檚 curator Bindi Vora. Together they will discuss how activism, protest and resistance underpins her work, examining the intersections of race, class and gender and the experience of systemic violence. Basu has become widely known for her influential photographic projects聽Blood Speaks, Centralia, To Conquer Her Land, and her most recent work聽贵颈谤别蹿濒颈别蝉,听which forms part of her solo exhibition at Autograph.
This year鈥檚 Future Now Symposium takes place 5-6 May in York, UK and online via Live Stream.
Running alongside the talks programme are further opportunities: portfolio review sessions, refreshments, film screenings and drinks receptions.聽
Image Credits:
1&3. Lumen, 2021. Still.聽Digital video mastered on 4K. Duration: 30 minutes. Colour with sound.漏聽Sutapa Biswas. All rights reserved, DACS 2021. Government Art Collection, UK.聽
2. Wayfinder聽(2022), 4K Feature Length Film WIth Stereo Sound. Commissioned By Turner Contemporary With MK Gallery & BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art. Supported through聽National Lottery Project Grants through Arts Council England.聽Courtesy of The Artist & Copperfield London.
4. Jamie Hawkesworth. Image from聽The British Isles聽(MACK, 2021). Courtesy of the artist and MACK.
5. Hannah Starkey,聽Untitled 鈥 October 1998, 1998.
6. From the book聽Centralia聽漏 Poulomi Basu.
