38th German Congress for Art History
38th German Congress for Art History
Munich, 25–28 February 2026
Call for Papers
knowing
“Knowing” seems to present more of a challenge than ever before. It is not just that the contents of our knowledge – the things people believe they know – are changing rapidly and that they are constantly reaching new levels of complexity. More importantly, epistemic practices and epistemic orders are increasingly in flux: there is currently a particularly intense renegotiation of how knowledge is generated, validated, communicated, rejected or deliberately distorted; who believes they know what when and how; and how various competing epistemic regimes relate to one another within different social and political (epistemic) contexts. At the same time, within the medial framework of epistemic dynamics, the visual occupies a key position. Its significance also seems to have decisively increased again in recent years. The question is: what role did the (historically emerging) exceptional position of the arts and artistic knowledge have in these contexts and what role can it play in the future? “Knowing” as a process in the broadest sense – featuring competing, plural, contradictory and rarely conclusive findings and convictions – thus presents itself with a new sense of urgency as a central analytical task for established as well as novel art historical fields and approaches.
The 38th German Congress for Art History, which will be held in Munich in 2026, addresses these challenges of “knowing”, with their interweaving of contemporary and historical perspectives. Its nine sessions seek to discuss the broadest possible range of questions related to knowledge, the visual arts and understanding as well as the explanation (in the widest sense) of the world: from practical workshop knowledge to the history of the discipline and its institutions to the opportunities and dangers of the digital sphere and AI. The theme of “knowing” additionally permits an evaluation of the development of art history and (interdisciplinary) visual culture studies over the last three decades. All sessions are open to proposals dealing with historical as well as contemporary themes.
The board of the Deutscher Verband für Kunstgeschichte e.V. (German Association for Art History) – together with the Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte (ZI) and the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU Munich) – would like our colleagues to join us for an intense discussion. We are requesting contributions from all fields of work and professional groups in the areas of art history and related disciplines, from people at any stage of their career and from Germany as well as abroad.
Proposals of no more than 2,000 characters (incl. spaces) can be submitted to the association’s offices sent by email to call@kunstgeschichte-kongress.de as an open or editable file (acceptable formats: .docx, .odt, .rtf, .txt). We additionally ask that you send a brief biography of no more than 2,000 characters (incl. spaces) in a separate file as well as your contact information and, if possible, your personal ORCID.
The selection of proposals (there will be five 20-minute presentations per session) will be carried out jointly by the session heads, the association’s board and the local committee.
The selected presenters – insofar as they are trained art historians residing in Germany – are expected to be members of the Deutscher Verband für Kunstgeschichte at the beginning of the year in which the congress is held, at the latest.
Please direct any questions about your submission to the offices of the Deutscher Verband für Kunstgeschichte e.V. in Bonn (info@kunstgeschichte.org).
Conference languages are German and English. The deadline for all submissions is 6pm (CET) on 8 June 2025.
The complete Call for Papers is available on our congress website:
https://kunstgeschichte-kongress.de/en/call-for-papers/
Since the congress is a biennial meeting of a German specialist society and an event of national significance with international participation, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) usually provides funding for speakers from foreign countries. Funding is provided for travel expenses (rail or air) for roundtrip travel to the meeting as well as maintenance costs for each day of the event.