The sacrosanctity of religious dogmas and beliefs,
stringent laws of repression and codes of moral and ethical
propriety have compelled artists to live and create with occupational
hazards like uncertain audience response, self-censorship and
accusations of deliberate misinterpretation of cultural production
looming over their heads. In extreme cases, the battle between
artistic iconoclasm and societal repression has forced creators
to put their life on the line in defence of liberal self-expression.
In recent years, issues surrounding the rights of minority cultures
to recognition and respect have raised new questions about the
contemporariness of the construct of blasphemy and sacrilege.
Controversies over the aesthetic representation of the sacred,
the exhibition of the sacred as art, and the public display
of sacrilegious or blasphemous works have given rise to heated
debates and have invited us to reflect on binaries like artistic
and religious sensibilities, tolerance and philistinism, the
sacred and the profane, deification and vilification.
This conference, the second in the series
“Negotiating the Sacred”, will draw together theologians,
historians, artists, lawyers, philosophers, political theorists,
anthropologists, sociologists, media representatives, museum
and art curators, as well as intellectuals from different religious
and cultural groups to speak about the conception of sacralisation
/desecration in artistic creation, representation of the sacred,
exhibiting the sacred and to address the concerns about sensitivity
towards religious and cultural difference.
Extra Information
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Contact us
Suzanne Groves, Reception
Centre for Cross Cultural Research
Australian National University
Liversidge Street, Acton
T: (02) 6125 2434
F: (02) 6248 0054
E: ccr.admin@anu.edu.au
Conveners
Dr Elizabeth Burns Coleman
Department of Philosophy
La Trobe University
T : (03) 9479 1093
Dr Maria-Suzette Fernandes Dias
Centre for Cross Cultural Research
Australian National University
T: (02) 6125 9879
E: maria-suzette.fernandesdias@anu.edu.au
Register online (registration closed)