CALL FOR PAPERS / PRESENTATIONS

Crossing the Line 2: Drawing in the Middle East - intersections of transdisciplinary practice and understanding will bring together specialists from various fields of research and practices to examine the role of drawing in the contemporary Middle East and its wider international interactions. It is hosted by the Department of Visual Communication, in the School of Architecture, Art & Design at the American University in Dubai, and partners with the Global Centre for Drawing, Melbourne Australia.

Friday-Sunday, September 12-14^th 2014

With accompanying exhibitions and events.

Optional excursions on September 11th and 15^th

Following the same premise as Crossing the Line 1 in November of2011, the Conference invites papers or artist/lab talks to consider the wider implications of drawing, from technology to ideology and cultural practices, from art, science, music, performance and architecture. Drawing can be considered as medium, as a tool, as notation, performance, and as a specific mode of thinking and imagining in the processes of invention, production, reproduction and communication within and across fields and disciplines.

Continuum: Crossing the Line 1

       “The trans-disciplinary approach of the conference will highlight the specificities, as well as the commonalities of the various dimensions, fields, forms and uses of drawing, broadly defined as the production and extension of lines in space, as the creation of meaning by marking surfaces, as the creation and fixation of visible paths that record and communicate patterns of temporal-spatial experiences.

       In this sense, drawing is the activity and product that makes explicit the interrelationships of flow and form in mental life. It mediates the flux of internal processes and allows the objectification of mental constructs and operations into practical-material as well as perceptual-symbolic entities.

       The central notion of Crossing the Line emphasizes the act and the idea of drawing as, on one hand, the setting of clear boundaries defining symbolic and material entities within a representational field and representational practices, while at the same time stressing the relational nature of all formalizing processes and constructs, of meaning making and communicative processes in general.

       In this sense, to draw is at the same time to establish a limit and to surpass it, it is to define the interrelated positive and negative components of any configuration. To draw is to create a boundary that is also an interface between domains, territories, modes of thinking and corresponding modes of being. To create a line is to produce a vector of thought and action, and in this sense, to mark a boundary is already to cross it, that is: drawing is a trans-formative process; it is the creation of new paths, new relationships, new configurations of knowledge.”     

Dr Marcelo Guimarães Lima, CEPAOS Research Center and University of São Paulo, Brazil

Crossing the Line 2

The conference will examine a potentially new nexus of drawing in the Middle East and fresh paradigms for drawing interculturally, extending and building on the themes from 2011:

1 Drawing as a transdisciplinary practice

2 Drawing as an intersection

3 Crossing the Line: hand and technology in a changing world

4 Drawing: a portrait and landscape-notations of our time

5 Pedagogical applications   

How have instructional methods evolved in light of broader definitions of drawing in the last decade? Papers that examine methods and theories of drawing instruction at all levels are welcome, referencing contemporary practice, historical context, experimental projects, etc.

6 Kinesthetics and Performance

As Paul Klee famously explained, ‘a line is a dot that has gone for a walk.’ Drawing, by definition, requires movement, whether physical, metaphoric, or poetic. Papers that consider kinesthetic relationships across the spectrum from performance, dance, science, all forms of the ‘laboratory’ are invited.  Proposals may include a performance component (there may be an opportunity for a soiree of performance drawing. TBC)

Schedule for Proposals:

Deadline for submissions: May 1^st , 2014

Results of Selection Committee: May 7, 2014

The Selection Committee is comprised of
 
Dr. Irene Barberis, International Chair
Prof. Julia Townsend, Middle East Chair

Dr. Marcelo Guimarães Lima, Publication Chair

There are two categories of submission for proposals:

Papers:(25 minute presentation): An abstract of maximum 500 words, images not required, for proposals for presentation. If accepted, the full paper is due for Peer Review by June 1, 2014. Of all of the accepted papers, eleven will be included in the subsequent publication and will be informed by July 1. (There will be up to 20 presentations)

The Peer Review Team is comprised of Dr. Irene Barberis, Dr. Marcelo Guimarães Lima, Janet Mackenzie, Julia Townsend.

The publication will be produced by Metasenta Publications:

Dr. Irene Barberis, Executive Editor

Dr. Marcelo Guimarães Lima, Editor

Julia Townsend, Editor

Luis Castaneda, Designer

Artist/Lab Talks (up to 30 minute presentation): An abstract of maximum 500 words. 3 images. These presentations will not be considered for publication.

ALL PROPOSALS MAY INCLUDE AN IMAGE (related to the proposal) FOR CONSIDERATION IN A CONFERENCE-RELATED EXHIBITION, additional to accompanying exhibitions already planned. Location may be on campus, near the conference presentation room (TBA). Image may be framed or unframed, of any 2d medium, up to 42 x 59 cms, and may be delivered on the first day of the conference. Please title this image “LastName_Firstname_4Consideration” and include title, date, size, and medium in the image list.

Please write to:
crossingthelineconference@gmail.com