PhD Graduation Ceremony on Schillertag

"Wiedergewinnung von Zukunftsoffenheit. Bilder als Impulse sozialen Imaginierens" (Reclaiming a sense of openness to the future. Images as catalysts for social imagination) Prof Dr Johannes Grave

In the wake of multiple crises, the room for manoeuvre in our present seems to be narrower and future scenarios appear bleaker. The long-held belief that we are heading towards a better future has become doubtful. How, under these circumstances, can we create space for positive visions of the future? These are the kinds of questions addressed by the new Jena Cluster of Excellence, ‘Imaginamics’. The talk takes a look back at the period 200 years ago, when the Restoration presented the existing order as having no alternative. In this situation, images offered opportunities to reclaim scope for thought and imagination.

The speaker:

Since 2019, Johannes Grave has been Professor of Modern Art History at Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, following positions in Basel, Paris and Bielefeld. He has published several books on artists such as Caspar David Friedrich, Goethe and Giovanni Bellini, as well as on the depiction of architecture in the early Italian Renaissance. He is the spokesperson for the Cluster of Excellence “Imaginamics. Practices and Dynamics of Social Imagining” and was awarded the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize in 2020.