TY - JOUR AU - Ott, Michaela PY - 2020/04/15 Y2 - 2024/03/29 TI - Aesthetic Dividuations in a Globalized Art World JF - AM Journal of Art and Media Studies JA - Art+Media VL - IS - 21 SE - Condition of Contemporary African Aesthetics DO - 10.25038/am.v0i21.356 UR - https://fmkjournals.fmk.edu.rs/index.php/AM/article/view/118 SP - 1-11 AB - <p>As a professor of philosophy in the art academy of Hamburg, I deal with contemporary art practices; as a theorist of aesthetics I try to determine what kind of aesthetic and artistic developments seem to be significant for our times, and which kind of philosophical theories I can offer in order to better conceptualize and understand the given art productions. At the same time, I attempt to transcend contemporary tendencies and concepts and to foster students’ art practices in a way that makes them meaningful for the future.</p><p>This lecture seeks to provide a possible interpretation of actual art practices in a globalized world, reflecting also on big art exhibitions such as Documenta 14 and on African films. It sketches a specific aesthetic program called <em>Afropolitanism</em> as an understanding which could be conceived of as paradigmatic for our globalized times. Afropolitanism is a term coined by the South African theorist Achille Mbembe in one of his 2010 book <em>Sortir de la grande nuit. Essai sur l’Afrique décolonisé</em>. Starting from there I want to offer a philosophical concept that goes far beyond the European context and hopes to provide a possible conceptual frame for a more complex understanding of the culturally and artistically entangled and hybridized expressions of our days, including those of human subjectivation. I call this concept <em>dividuation</em> as I have explained further in my book <em>Dividuations: Theories of Participation,</em> which was published in English in 2018.</p><p> </p><p>Article received: December 15, 2019; Article accepted: January 31, 2029; Published online: April 15, 2020; Original scholarly paper</p> ER -