Call For Papers - Thinking with Materials across Histories and Practices

CFP: Thinking with Materials across Histories and Practices

The Centre for Doctoral Studies UMPRUM is pleased to announce an international doctoral conference focused on materials and materiality in the methodology of art history. We invite participants to join us on October 1–2, 2026 for a two-day conference at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague.  

Referring to the material, linguistic, or pictorial turn has become a convenient way for art historians to register methodological change. However, such labels risk smoothing over more gradual transformations or historiographical precedents.

If we understand the objects of our inquiry as silent messengers (Dupré, 2011), it is their material that underpins their communicative force. In what is ostensibly an object-oriented discipline, one might expect material to be a fundamental point of inquiry. As Ernst Gombrich observed, even the most ordinary object, such as a teacup, opens questions rooted in its substance, physical behaviour, and mode of production (Gombrich, 1988). An object may invite multiple avenues of analysis, yet it is the material itself that first sets these questions in motion. 

However, as the material turn itself demonstrates, the interest in material has gradually slipped into the background, overshadowed by approaches that tended to privilege formal or iconographic concerns.

If the material turn may be understood as an invitation to re-examine the discipline’s own history (Fricke and Lehmann, 2024), the forthcoming conference seeks to pursue it with more horizontal perspectives and microhistories in mind.  

The attached call for papers lists the questions and topics that our conference will address.

The conference will be held in person, but online participation is also possible. The main language of the event will be English, and papers should not exceed 20 minutes. PhD students and early career researchers are particularly encouraged to apply.

To be considered, please submit a proposal of 200–300 words along with a short bio (up to 150 words) to email addresses listed below by March 31, 2026. Notifications of acceptance will be sent by the end of April 2026.

There is no registration fee. The conference will cover meals for all presenters during the conference. We hope to offer travel support; reimbursement will depend on pending funding arrangements. We will update participants when funding is confirmed.

Send abstracts and a short bio to: monika.drlikova@umprum.cz and david.blaha@umprum.cz

Organizing Comittee:
David Bláha, Denisa Dolanská, Monika Drlíková, Tomáš Klička, Veronika Králíková Červená, Veronika Soukupová