Cosponsors
  • Institute for Comparative Literature and Society
  • Harriman Institute
  • East Central European Center
Organizers
  • Malgorzata Mazurek, Professor of Polish Studies, Columbia University
  • Alan H. Timberlake, Director of East Central European Center, Columbia University
  • Eliza Rose, PhD Student in Slavic Languages, Columbia University

This workshop will contribute to a growing counter-commentary that reckons with ‘outmoded’ motifs in the built landscapes of East and Central Europe. Socialist building projects are too often savored as ruins and filed away as elegies to utopian chimeras. Signatures of moved and dispersed populations in the topography of these regions are often memorialized in a discourse of nostalgia forecloses on the future. Are there other stories to tell about buildings and spaces that have outlived their original ideological assignments? Can we swap out a forensic account of obsolescence for a discussion of how these environments were lived in and made use of? What options exist today for repurposing, preserving and re-inhabiting these time-stamped sites: how can we accommodate their particularities, and how can they once again accommodate us? Throughout two days of conversations, we will reflect on these questions and voice some strategies for enlivening and caring for the heterogeneous landscapes of today’s East and Central Europe.

Please note this conference will take place at the following locations and times:

- Friday, Oct. 23: International Affairs Building, Room 1512, Columbia University. No ID required.
- Saturday, Oct. 24: Heyman Center for the Humanities, Second Floor Common Room. ID required for entry.

This event is sponsored by the East Central European Center at Columbia University. It is part of the Campus Project organized by Culture.pl.

Program

October 23, 2015  Friday

5:30pm - 8:00pm EDT

Diagnostic strategies: The health, welfare and maintenance of built environments
Chair

Alan Timberlake

Professor of Slavic Languages; Director of East Central European Center

"“Forgetting the Future? Urban Amnesia in Post-Communist Czechoslovakia”

Jana Berankova

PhD Student

Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation

“Kraków wasn't built in a day - modernist architecture after 1956 and the question of heritage”

Andrzej Szczerski

Professor

Institute of Art History, Jagiellonian University

“Habsburg Cities: Lessons of Cohabitation from the Austro-Hungarian Empire”

Markian Prokopovych

Lecturer

Institute for East European History, University of Vienna

Respondent

October 24, 2015  Saturday

9:30am - 10:00am EDT

Coffee and Welcome

10:00am - 12:30pm EDT

Panel: Habitats and Refuge: Historicizing and Accommodating Catastrophe
Chair

Tarik Amar

Assistant Professor of History

Columbia University

Co-Presenter: “The Futures of Jewish Spaces in Contemporary Poland”

Michael Meng

Assistant Professor of History

Clemson University

Co-Presenter: “The Futures of Jewish Spaces in Contemporary Poland”

Erica Lehrer

Canada Research Chair in Post-Conflict Memory, Ethnography, and Museology

Concordia University

“Engaging with Jewish and Soviet Sites: Heritage, Legacies and Public in Lviv”

Sofia Dyak

Director

The Center for Urban History of East Central Europe

“Ecological and Cultural Restoration in the Cleansed Czechoslovak Borderlands: Past, Present, Future”

Eagle Glassheim

Associate Professor of History

Department of History, University of British Columbia

Respondent

Anna Kats

Architecture and Design Editor

Blouin Artinfo

12:30pm - 2:30pm EDT

Lunch

2:30pm - 4:00pm EDT

Keynote
Introduction

Małgorzata Mazurek

Associate Professor of Polish Studies

Columbia University

"Mobilities of Architecture between Eastern Europe and the Gulf, 1970s-1990s”

Lukasz Stanek

Lecturer

School of Environment, Education and Development, University of Manchester

Respondent

Srdjan Jovanovic Weiss

Adjunct Assistant Professor

Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, Columbia University

4:00pm - 6:30pm EDT

Panel: Emotion, Affect and Afterimages of Modernity
Chair

Eliza Rose

PhD Student, Slavic Languages and Literatures Program, Columbia University

“Emotion and its Effects on the Post-Socialist Cityscape”

David Crowley

Professor and Head of Critical Writing in Art & Design

School of Humanities, Royal College of Art

“Modalities of Modern Architecture. Photographic Atlases of Nicolas Grospierre and Wojciech Wilczyk”

Adam Mazur

Lecturer

University of Arts in Poznań

“Twice Outmoded: Bogdan Bogdanović and the Redemptive Power of Outmoded Memorials”

Vladimir Kulić

Associate Professor of Architectural History and Theory

School of Architecture, Florida Atlantic University

Respondent

Juliet Koss

Associate Professor of Art History, Director of the Humanities Institute

Scripps College

Participants
  • Małgorzata Mazurek Associate Professor of Polish Studies Columbia University
  • Alan Timberlake Professor of Slavic Languages; Director of East Central European Center
  • Eliza Rose PhD Student, Slavic Languages and Literatures Program, Columbia University
  • Tarik Amar Assistant Professor of History Columbia University
  • Jana Berankova PhD Student Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation
  • Srdjan Jovanovic Weiss Adjunct Assistant Professor Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, Columbia University
  • Andrzej Szczerski Professor Institute of Art History, Jagiellonian University
  • Lukasz Stanek Lecturer School of Environment, Education and Development, University of Manchester
  • Markian Prokopovych Lecturer Institute for East European History, University of Vienna
  • Michael Meng Assistant Professor of History Clemson University
  • Adam Mazur Lecturer University of Arts in Poznań
  • Erica Lehrer Canada Research Chair in Post-Conflict Memory, Ethnography, and Museology Concordia University
  • Vladimir Kulić Associate Professor of Architectural History and Theory School of Architecture, Florida Atlantic University
  • Juliet Koss Associate Professor of Art History, Director of the Humanities Institute Scripps College
  • Eagle Glassheim Associate Professor of History Department of History, University of British Columbia
  • Sofia Dyak Director The Center for Urban History of East Central Europe
  • David Crowley Professor and Head of Critical Writing in Art & Design School of Humanities, Royal College of Art
  • Jana Berankova PhD Student Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation
  • Tarik Amar Assistant Professor of History Columbia University
  • Anna Kats Architecture and Design Editor Blouin Artinfo