In communist Central, Eastern and Southern Europe, the building of socialism had as its final endpoint a utopia that provided the ultimate motivation: sacrifice now, reward later. In its sheer impossibility, it was an elusive and illusory dream that formed the foundation for everyday life under totalitarian regime. Within this visionary world, artists such as Alexander Mlynarcik (Slovakia), Marko Kovacic (Slovenia) or Mark Verlan (Moldova), created their own parallel worlds, utopias, dystopias, and fantastic domains. In many cases, alternative and nonofficial artists’ works served to carve out a unique space in the so-called “grey zone” of Europe, which offered an alternative not only to state-sponsored socialism, but also to Western capitalism, both of which many artists and dissidents viewed with equal suspicion. This panel will examine a range of artistic ideas, participative strategies, subversive practices, networks and projects (imaginary or real), which demonstrate an alternative sphere of thinking and modes of creative living, and which possibly attempt to move beyond the classical binary systems of West and East – all from within an everyday world order that seemed to be set in stone. We also invite papers that offer a more differentiated view, even extending to the post-socialist period, aiming to re-evaluate the nexus of aesthetics and politics and produce new interpretations and analytical approaches regarding counterculture and censorship, which explore the relational aspects of following binaries: official and unofficial, political and apolitical, permitted and prohibited – under totalitarian rule.

The deadline for abstracts is November 10, 2014. Paper proposals must be emailed directly to the session convenor(s). You must provide a 250 word abstract for a 30 minute paper. Include your name and institution affiliation (if any). Please follow the format found in the “Paper Proposal Guidelines” document found here.

Session Convenors:

Amy Bryzgel, University of Aberdeen, a.bryzgel at abdn.ac.uk
Andrea Euringer-Bátorová, Academy of Fine Arts and Design, Bratislava, Slovakia, euringer-batorova at vsvu.sk