To face a world where images dominate the stage, not only codes of ethics, quality standards but also critical reading and discernment skills are urgently needed.
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The first day focuses on exchanging with professionals in the field of photography. On the second day, a group of emerging photographers, all shortlisted for 2021 Blurring the Lines's Award, will be called to discuss the current relationship between photography and ethics.
Beyond its unique way of making visual information, photography has become the universal medium through which image-makers raise essential questions on human ethics and responsibility. Since its invention, photography was a decisive factor in gestating and deploying a new way of observing, representing, and understanding reality and with it ourselves. For the 2021 edition, the theme « Ethical shifts in photography » aims to explore the power, the moral principles, and the responsibilities of photography in all its dimensions: the rights of privacy and publicity, cultural representation, appropriation, confidentiality, copyright, intellectual property, sustainability, ethics of wildlife, and nature photography, ethics in photojournalism, and accountability as well as the use of technology that started to challenge the landscape of ethics by doing things to photos without the viewer even being aware. Ethics and photography are two terms that seem distant in the first instance: the first a foreshortening of philosophy, the second an activity sustained by a technological artifact. Photography can ask questions about the ethics of the world, but more likely, the world can ask questions about the ethics of photography. Faced with an overproduction of images by all means and possibilities, today more than ever is vital to distinguish what is significant and pertinent from what is purely aesthetic. This call brings to the fore the theme of the education and responsibility of seeing. To face a world where images dominate the stage, not only codes of ethics, quality standards but also critical reading and discernment skills are urgently needed.
During the conference, we will present also the new catalog published by Urbanautica Institute in collaboration with Faservice. For this edition, it was an honor and a privilege to welcome Amak Mahmoodian as our guest curator and the winners of the 2020 edition, Ragna Arndt-Marić, Thembinkosi Hlatshwayo, and Riti Sengupta. In 2020, we received 151 applications coming from 38 participating photography schools worldwide. Thirty-six photographers were shortlisted and featured in the catalog, and some special mentions were associated with Blurring the Lines partner's initiatives, such as the photo lunch talks at Paris College of Art, the conference at European Cultural Centre, and Take-Off with FOTODOK. The call aims to involve a network of international academies and institutes of art in enhancing and rewarding graduate thesis works all over the world. Blurring the Lines started in 2016 has received more than 400 project proposals from 38 institutions across the world; and successfully managed to show the selected works at FotoFever and Espace F15 in Paris, at HKU University of the Arts in Utrecht, the Netherlands, and the Palazzo Mora at the Venice Biennale in 2019.
© Blurring the Line new edition, Urbanautica Institute, 2021
© Blurring the Line new edition, Urbanautica Institute, 2021
© Blurring the Line new edition, Urbanautica Institute, 2021
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PROGRAM OF THE CONFERENCE
Friday, November 19th, 2021 - hybrid (online and in presence)
Part I - Educational Learning settings (Photography as an Educational Learning System)
10h Welcome
Ethical shifts in photography | Klaus Fruchtnis - Co-founder of Blurring the Lines, Associate Dean of Graduate Studies, Chair of Photography at Paris College of Art, Paris, France
10h10
Between Freedom and Disorder: An Ecology of Learning and Practice | Keynote speaker: Sarker Protick - Professor at Pathshala South Asian Media Institute and Co-curator at Chobi Mela International Festival of Photography, Pathshala, Bangladesh
10h25
Through the desire to see, to look and to be seen: understanding visual ethics in Russia | Feodora Kaplan - Co-founder of Docdocdoc School of Modern Photography, Saint Petersburg, Russia
10h40
Anti-Mapping | Miki Kratsman - Professor at Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem, Israel
10h55
Training aware professionals: ethics in photography between school and work | Sara El Beshbichi - Professor at Istituto Italiano di Fotografia, Milano, Italy
11h10
Representing Ourselves and the Other: Identity and Ethics in Photography | Amanda Breitbach - Assistant Professor of Art, Stephen F. Austin State University, Nacogdoches, United States
11h25
Art and Reality Representation in an environment of intense circulation of images | André Fratti Costa - Professor at Fundação Armando Alvares Penteado, São Paulo, Brazil
11h40-12h30Q & A
BREAK
Part II - Professional Learning Settings (Photography and Entrepreneurship)
14h30
Launching of Blurring the Lines 2021 catalog | Steve Bisson - Co-founder of Blurring the Lines and Founder director of Urbanautica Institute, Venice, Italy
14h40
Ethics and aesthetic (Hai detto buongiorno stamattina?) [Did you say good morning this morning?] | Laura Davì - Independent photo editor and journalist, Milan, Italy
14h55
Lithuanian Art and Culture in Italy | Laura Gabrielaitytė-Kazulėnienė - Cultural Attaché at the Embassy of Lithuania in Rome, Italy
15h10
In the Archive; Photography as Document of Social Practice | Jac Capra - Chief Archivist for the French American Creative Exchange, La Courneuve, France
15h25
The school in the city - on documenting a school for girls in Afghanistan | Nic Lehoux - Architectural photographer, Vancouver, Canada
15h40
How the Care ethic can transform the way art is sold | Florence Manuguerra - Founder director of The Caring Gallery, Paris, France
15h55-16h30Q & A
17h30: Aperitivo
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Saturday, November 20th, 2021 - online
Panel 1 - 11h-11h45 (Italy time, UTC+1): The ethical range in photography
Moderator: Ragna Arndt-Maric (Blurring the Lines, winner of the 2020 edition)
Participants: Isha Gahlot - National Institute of Design, Gandhinagar, India | Anna Gajewszky - Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest, Hungary | So-Jung Yoon - Seoul Institute of the Arts, Seoul, South Korea | Lina Van Hulle - Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp, Belgium | Mirre Korevaar-Winjia - St. Joost School of Art & Design, Breda, The Netherlands.
© Anna Gajewszky
Panel 2 - 11h45-12h30 (Italy time, UTC+1): Reciprocity and cultural context
Moderator: Jonna Bruinsma (Blurring the Lines, finalist of the 2019 edition)
Participants: Ranji Mangcu - University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa | Assaf Hinden - Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium | Saja Quttaineh - Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem, Israel | Alex Harbich - University of Applied Sciences Europe, Berlin/Hamburg, Germany | Mark McGuinness - Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture, Helsinki, Finland.
© Ranji Mangcu
BREAK
Panel 3 - 15h-15h45 (Italy time, UTC+1): Social media implications
Moderator: Alexandra Maldonado (Blurring the Lines, finalist of the 2020 edition)
Participants: Jana Rothe - University of Applied Sciences Europe, Berlin/Hamburg, Germany | Milah Van Zuilen - Willem de Kooning Academy, Rotterdam, The Netherlands | Nona Griffin - Paris College of Art, Paris, France | Alexander Komenda - University of South Wales-Pontypridd, United Kingdom | Yarení Aguado - Academia de Artes Visuales, Mexico City, Mexico.
© Nona Griffin
Panel 4 - 15h45-16h30 (Italy time, UTC+1): The role of the audience
Moderator: Daan Russcher (Blurring the Lines, finalist of the 2020 edition)
Participants: Tyler Deharte - Parsons School of Design, New York, United States | Suzannah Olanrewaju-Gabriel - London College of Fashion, London, United Kingdom | Camilla Marrese - Istituto Superiore per le Industrie Artistiche, Urbino, Italy | Raúl Armando Jiménez Jiménez - Academia de Artes Visuales, Mexico City, Mexico | Antonia De Noronha - ELISAVA Escola Universitària de Disseny i Enginyeria de Barcelona, Spain.
© Antonia De Noronha
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More information about the project, participating schools, the publication, exhibitions, and educational program can be found on Blurring the Lines.
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