Art-historical research still perceives Europe as being traversed by a diffusely imagined boundary, which, with a view to recent history, is often hastily equated with the trajectory of the former Iron Curtain. This perception needs to be called into question. This concept needs to be called into question. Both from the west and from the east, we approach the area that is provisionally referred to here as ‘Eastern Europe’ with a question mark. Aspects of its art and visual history are highlighted and inscribed into a broader scholarly debate. Moreover, the regional approach chosen here holds a critical potential as a result of its own historical genesis and the highly interdisciplinary nature of the research on Eastern Europe. This should also stimulate the discussion of fundamental problems of methodology and historiography in art historical research. In addition to thematic issues ‘Looking East’ will present coverage of conferences, exhibitions and current research on the art history of Eastern Europe.

contakt: ostblick@kunsttexte.de

Editors

Antje Kempe is an art historian and senior researcher at the Interdisciplinary Centre for Baltic Sea Region Research (IFZO) at the University of Greifswald, responsible mainly for the research area "The Topicality of Cultural Heritage". Previously she was a research assistant at the Caspar David Friedrich Institute at the University of Greifswald and at the Chair of Art History of Eastern Europe, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. She holds a PhD from the Humboldt University of Berlin with a thesis "Warfare Ethos and Memoria. The Representation of the Military Nobility in Silesia (1648–1742)". Her research focuses on the fields of memory culture, cultural heritage, garden history and the historiography of art after 1945. In her current research project, "Liquid Environments", she is focusing on water and the ways in which it is a constitutive factor for the design of landscape(s) in gardens from the early modern period to the contemporary urban setting.

Robert Born, Dr. is a research associate at the Federal Institute for the Culture and History of the Germans in Eastern Europe, Department of Art History. He was previously a research assistant, project coordinator and head of project at the Leibniz Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO) at the University of Leipzig. Furthermore, he has been a research associate and deputy professor at the Chair of Art History of Eastern Europe, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin. He was awarded his doctorate at the Humboldt University of Berlin with the thesis “Die Christianisierung der Städte der Provinz Scythia Minor" (The Christianisation of the Cities of the Province of Scythia Minor). His research and teaching focus on cultural contacts between the Ottoman Orient and East Central Europe and historiographies of art in East Central and South Eastern Europe from the eighteenth to the twentieth century.

Katja Bernhardt, Dr. is an art and image historian. She is researcher at the Nordost-Institut, Lüneburg with a regional focus on Poland. Previously, she was a research assistant and later deputy professor at the Chair of Art History of Eastern Europe, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. She holds a PhD from the same university, based on the thesis "Style - Space – Order. Teaching Architecture in Gdansk 1904-1945". Her research and teaching focus on the analysis of architecture and of urban spaces and their visualisation since the industrialisation period until today, the visual history of Eastern and East Central Europe, specifically Poland, and the history of the discipline of art history.