What Now? 2014 is a two-day symposium organized by Art in General in collaboration with the Vera List Center for Art and Politics. This launches a new series of annual conferences, called to investigate issues arising in the field of contemporary art. This year’s conference is dedicated to Collaboration and Collectivity and organized around three sessions spanning Friday and Saturday, with a keynote lecture on Friday evening, delivered by Charles Esche.
In the spirit of philosopher Hannah Arendt, who taught at The New School for many years, the symposium examines collaboration through a politics of place—how the way in which we live and work together directly creates the political landscape we inhabit. In Arendt’s words, “To live together in the world means essentially that a world of things is between those who have it in common, as a table is located between those who sit around it; the world, like every in-between, relates and separates men at the same time.”