Literature and Art Narratives under Lockdown

Saturday 12/12/2020
An online event organized by the Laboratory of Narrative Research

The Laboratory of Narrative Research at the School of English, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, is organizing an one-day online symposium titled “Art and Literature Narratives under Lockdown” on Saturday 12 December 2020, 11:30-15:00.

Organizing Committee:

The COVID-19 outbreak and lockdown(s) have caused a huge rupture to the structure and flow of the world as we know it. The creative industry has been particularly afflicted by this awkward break in “normality”; literature and the arts (be it theatre, cinema, music or painting) see their working logics cancelled or dramatically altered, and seek new ways of refashioning their narratives and of sharing them with the general public. Online performances and concerts, virtual tours of galleries, readings via social media and video streaming platforms are all examples of this new era of literary and artistic production.

The purpose of this LNR event is to explore this “new normal” of the creative sector in the COVID-19 era. How do artists, dancers, actors and writers reinvent the ways in which literature and the arts narrate life and how do they reach their readers, llisteners or viewers during the age of compulsory online contact? Are the new cross-generic, cross-media aesthetic forms that are produced as a result only to be seen as the art/creative world’s short-term “survival tactics”, or are they here to stay and influence narrative experience in the creative sector as we know it? How do they make up for the loss of physical intimacy and how do they enrich, reassess or are inspired  by the enforced experience of social distancing and isolation that so much shapes our COVID era? How do they negotiate the displacement of such staple “values” as the tactile, the bodily, the intimate and the collective? How do they redefine (physical) space and spatial dichotomies, such as distance and proximity, home intimacy and public exposure?

The symposium will welcome a number of speakers (both scholars and practitioners) who will address some of these concerns in a series of online conversations which will also involve participants for a Q&A session.

Parallel to the event, a virtual exhibition of the School of English students’ creative projects and initiatives, all produced during the first lockdown period in Spring 2020, will also be available.

The symposium will be in Greek.

Literature and Art Narratives under Lockdown