The Glasgow School of Art

Jan Verwoert
'From Appropriation to Evocation' listen to audio recording

For some time people thought that history was finished and all that was left were its relics; dead stuff, sitting on the shelves of the supermarkets, ready to be bought, stolen, or, 'appropriated' as they called it. It was the era of the Cold War and the heyday of Postmodernism. Today, history has sprung to life again. A manifold of unresolved historical conflicts haunt the present like unappeased ghosts. How can we deal with these ghosts in art practice? In what ways can we evoke and address them or even live with them?

Jan Verwoert is a critic based in Berlin.  During 2003-6 he was Visiting Professor at Umeå University, Sweden.  Verwoert is a contributing editor of frieze magazine and also writes for a number of journals including the Dutch magazine Metropolis M, Afterall and Piktogram. His book 'Bas Jan Ader - In Search of the Miraculous' was published by Afterall Books in 2005.