The Roof is On Fire
… or at least your e-mail account is, thanks to the ‘Under Fire’ online forum on violence and representation. Hosted by Rotterdam’s Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, an esteemed crew of artists, theorists, critics, sociologists, and scholars are leading an e-mail discussion, producing a series of publications (including excerpts from the online record), and hosting conferences throughout 2004. Investigating Western and Middle Eastern images of conflict, the organization and decentralization of violence, the legacy of the military-industrial complex, and a slew of questions on identity, universality, and representation, the project’s ‘no child left untheorized’ scope is, to say the least, ambitious. But as the most pressing global issues are used and abused by political rhetoric and visual practice, it’s time for consumers of art to educate themselves – and mapping your relationship to systems, acts, and images of violence can’t hurt, either. Judging from the first thread, which focuses on the economics of terrorism, ‘Under Fire’ is bound to be, um, explosive. Join the year-long conversation by sending an e-mail to underfire-request@list.v2.nl with the word ‘subscribe’ in the subject line. - Christine Smallwood
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