GREAT NEWS! Due to the large number of requests, we are extending the V-Cybercult Conference call for abstracts deadline to August 15.

The Institute for Multidisciplinary Research in Art (ICMA) and the Faculty of Visual Arts and Design at George Enescu National University of the Arts (UNAGE) are pleased to invite submissions of abstracts, panel proposals, and artistic research contributions for the Visuality and Cyberculture International Conference. The theme of the V-Cybercult 2022 conference is Beyond Biopolitics: Visual Digital Culture and the 21st Century Disruptive Events.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine flooded traditional and digital media with static and moving images including newsreels, amateur, and drone footage, or satellite imagery displaying military force abuse, violence against civilians, shelling, damaged and destroyed buildings, and people leaving their homes and country in what was described as the largest exodus since WW2. While social media was banned in Russia and started, in return, to track and control information related to war all over the world, fake news and image manipulation reached maximum levels and seem to be a novelty in re-creating an old-World War discourse within the EU.

However, such imagery of socially and politically disruptive events, following the paths of globalization, was already present in the contemporary visual culture for the last two decades. Attempts to manipulate, control, divert and even capitalize such visual data were an integral part of contemporary crisis management of military conflicts and health emergencies taking place in other parts of the world beyond Europe. The conjunction of bio-, necro-, and psychopolitics, on the one hand, and digitally produced and circulated images associated with socially and politically disruptive events, on the other hand, raises several questions such as: What are the main differences between the reproduction and production of these events in the digital media realm? What is their social impact? How did the digital productions articulate and/or calibrate the political and traditional media discourses? What trends and digital policies can be linked to the control and dissemination of imagery through social networks? What are the main differences between war, pandemic, and other forms of social unrest? How did digitality mediate the COVID-19 pandemic discourse and influence the netizens? How did the latter's activity contribute to the spread of panic and the creation of an infodemic and, eventually, a climate of fear? Soon after, how has digitality changed the way the world perceived the Russian-Ukrainian conflict? How are the EU and US’s geopolitical implications and power relations reflected in the digital mediascape? At the same time, what role do digitally co-produced images such as memes play in the dissemination, circulation, and criticism of information? What types of civic and political resistance were or can still be imagined by artists and netizens alike?

Keynote Speakers

• Mark Deuze - Professor of Journalism and Media Culture at the University of Amsterdam.
• Jan Van Dijk - Professor of Communication Science and the Sociology of the Information Society at the University of Twente.
• Payal Arora - Professor of Technology, Values, and Global Media Cultures at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
• Ryan M. Milner - Associate Professor of Mediated Communication at the College of Charleston.

Submission Guidelines

• Individual proposal – The abstracts of the communications (maximum 250 words) must be accompanied by 5 keywords, 3 bibliographical references and a biographical note of the author (maximum 200 words).
• Panel proposals should include a short description and rationale (200 words) together with abstracts for each of the 3-4 papers (150-200 words each including 5 keywords, 3 bibliographical references and details of the contributor), and the name and contact details of the panel proposer. The panel proposer should coordinate the submissions for that panel as a single proposal.
• Artistic research – We actively support the presentation of artistic research related to the conference theme and topics. Abstracts should be up to 200 words with 3-4 screenshots of the artistic work or project and a biographical note.
• Book presentations for authors who want to present their recent or on-going projects – send an abstract of maximum 250 words and a bibliographical note.

List of Topics

Beyond Biopolitics: Visual Digital Culture and the 21st Century Disruptive Events encourages engagement with a wide range of topics, which we hope will attract researchers interested in the Y2K problem, 9/11, the Global Financial Crisis, the Boko Haram insurgency, the Mexican drug war, the Syrian Civil War, the Yemeni Crisis, the Tigray War, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Russo-Ukrainian War in terms of power relations, visual politics, political aesthetics, information politics, biocommunicability,  activist media, network society and the state of emergency, social distancing or memetic warfare. Hence, proposals might address the various social, political, economic, artistic, individual, collective, institutional, representational, and technological dimensions of digital interactions and environments. As mentioned, potential topics include, but are not limited to:

• Bio-, necro- and psychopower in the information age.
• Biopolitical aesthetics.
• Biocommunicability and the public sphere.
• Information biopolitics and network society.
• Disruptive events in a global age: digital media and reporting conflict.
• Electronic/platform colonialism.
• Network attention.
• Digital citizens and revolutions.
• Participatory culture and memetic warfare.
• Netnography and cyberethics.
• Post-literate society.
• Technocriticism.
• Technorealism.
• Platform capitalism and social media ideologies.
• Cancel culture.
• Post-truth politics.

Organizing committee

• Cristian Nae (Director of ICMA and Associate Professor, UNAGE Iași)
• Cătălin Gheorghe (Associate Professor, UNAGE Iași)
• Cristina Moraru (Assistant Professor, UNAGE Iași)
• Daniel Ungureanu (Ph.D. Candidate, UNAGE Iași)

Publication

Visuality and Cyberculture International Conference organizing committee is aiming to publish an edited collection of papers focusing on the conference theme with a reputable academic publisher. Further details of how to submit will be announced after the conference.

Keynotes

• The conference takes place online.
• The event’s official language is English.
• Submission and participation are free of charge.
• All proposals (abstracts and practice-based work) will be peer-reviewed.
• Abstracts will be submitted in PDF format.
• Submissions must be original and written in English.
• All rights of the submission contents are kept by the authors.
• Accepted submissions will be presented at the Conference: 20 min.
• All questions about submissions should be addressed to the organizing committee at: v.cybercult@unage.ro or https://www.facebook.com/icmaunage.

Important dates

• Submission deadline: July 31 August 15.

• Acceptance notice: August 15.

• Official program announcement: September 1.

• Conference: November 17-19

Contact

• Websites: https://www.arteiasi.ro/?page_id=1144&lang=eng, https://icma.arteiasi.ro/.
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/icmaunage, https://www.instagram.com/icmaunage/.