Decolonising Art and Its Histories (AHIS30026)

Delivered by a team of Austral experts, this subject explores current approaches and debates to decolonisation in the visual arts. With a focus on seeing from the south, it considers artistic forms of critique, including how the legacies and impacts of colonisation are navigated by modern and contemporary artists, writers, art historians, curators and other cultural producers. The subject encompasses topics such as the colonial archive; the retention and repatriation of cultural material; the centring of global Indigenous knowledges, and the critical role of First Nations voices in contemporary culture. The theoretical issues that inform this subject include the relationship between decolonisation, feminism and environmentalism; the history of racial stereotyping in visual cultures; the challenges of cultural agency in the face of colonial legacies; migration and new forms of colonialism and crosscultural collaboration and appropriation. Imperative for those who aim to practice in the southern hemisphere, this subject contributes to the ways in which seeing from the south can not only expose and critique normalised Eurocentric perspectives, but also contribute to future global perspectives.