With forthcoming conferences in Leeds (Communication and the City) and Helsinki (The Spectacular/Contested/Ordinary Media City), not to mention the special Media and Urban Life (PDF) track in which I recently presented at the Urban Affairs Association conference, it’s been a very busy year for all things media and cities. Now, we can add yet another interesting-looking conference, Mediating Cityscapes, which will take place this September 2013 in The Hague. What distinguishes this conference is that is will be held during the annual arts festival Two Days Art. The call for papers is pasted below.

MEDIATING CITYSCAPES

Den Haag/The Hague

27-28 September, 2013

If urban space has historically been defined by the relation between static structures and mobile subjects, this dichotomy is fast giving way to hybrid spatialities characterized by dynamic flows which not only dissolve the fixity of traditional modes of spatial enclosure, but problematize the unified presence of the subject traversing their contours. Scott McQuire, The Media City (2008)

As Scott McQuire suggests, the contemporary city is marked by a number of tensions found between fixity and flow and the resulting hybrid spatialities which are shaped by a multifarious range of mediations. Historically, certain of these mediations, such as film, photography, music, art, and more recently, mobile and locative media, have helped shape the diverse strata which compose both the material and immaterial dimensions of the contemporary city. In form, and as practices and discourses, they have also afforded opportunities to critically engage with and creatively intervene in the city. As part of the annual arts festival Two Days Art, held in Den Haag, this interdisciplinary symposium will focus on creative and artistic responses to the mediated cityscape. We encourage papers and submissions from academics, artists and practitioners that consider the multiple ways in which various media (film, music, photographic, digital, etc.), creative practices, and technologies put in to play a diverse array of encounters and interfaces that engage with, interrupt, reconstitute, or resist the hybrid spatialities which define the contemporary cityscape.

Abstracts of no longer than 250 words can be sent to: geoff.stahl@vuw.ac.nz

Closing Date: Friday, June 14th 2013.

Participants will be notified by July 1st, 2013.
More on Two Days Art here: http://todaysart.org