Welcome to the 36th CIHA Congress registration platform

 

The Comité français d’histoire de l’art (CFHA), the Institut National d’Histoire de l’Art (INHA) and the Laboratoire de Recherche Historique Rhône-Alpes (LARHRA) are thrilled to invite you to the 36th Congress of the Comité International d’Histoire de l’Art in Lyon from 23 to 28 June 2024.

The CIHA Congress gathers every four years researchers from all over the world around a strong theme of the field of art history. The congress is open to advanced and junior scholars of all professional backgrounds. It offers a unique experience of sharing with the international scientific community. 

The theme suggested is « Matter / Materiality»

Why this choice of theme? 

Matter and materiality are inherent to the conception, production, and interpretation of artifacts in all cultures across all periods of time. In recent decades these notions have given rise to theoretical reflections, including a rethinking of the hylemorphic model (form/matter opposition). A world is open to us in which matter is no longer fixed and inert but in motion, in the grip of infinite transformations, a world of flux (G. Deleuze, T. Ingold), where vital matter is endowed with agency (J. Bennett). Materiality, resulting from the effect produced by the properties of matter, is grasped within environments and contexts of reception that are also changing and have nothing fixed or definitive.

The material conception of works of art confers complementary properties and values upon the resulting objects. These properties are manifested through the effects of texture, surfaces, weight, extension in space, format, gestural traces, and material effects. The concept of materiality therefore refers to the fact that the artifacts which concern art history are composed of materials and, at a theoretical level, to all the processes — technical, cultural and social — that undergird the realization and the material perception of works of art.

It is in this spirit that the theme chosen for the 36th CIHA congress is intended. Our theme thus provides an opportunity for fruitful intercultural and interdisciplinary dialogue on questions that promote a transversal perspective at the intersection of approaches and methodologies.