events

From June 8-10, 2026, the conference The Power of Art: Aesthetics and Politics in Classical German Philosophy will be held at the Departiment of Philosophy, Sociology, Education and Applied Psycology of the Univeristy of Padua.

The event will be held both in person and online. To attend via Zoom, please use the following link: https://unipd.zoom.us/launch/jc/84059901744

The conference is organized by Francesco Campana and Gabriele Tomasi. It is the second conference within the PolArt project, following the first conference, which was held at the New School for Social Research in New York in February 2025.

The event has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 101066460 (Project: PolArt – Political Art: Understanding the Function of Art in the Contemporary Social Space Through a New Interpretation of Classical German Philosophy.

The conference is sponsored by the Italian Society of Aesthetics and the PhD Program in Philosophy at the University of Padua, and is organized within the framework of the activities of the hegelpd research group.

PROGRAM

University of Padua

Department of Philosophy, Sociology, Education and Applied Psychology

June 8-10, 2026

The Power of Art

Aesthetics and Politics in Classical German Philosophy

11.00: Visit to the Scrovegni Chapel*

June 8, Sala delle Edicole

15.00: Reception

15.15-15.30: Francesco Campana, Gabriele Tomasi, Greetings and Introduction

Chair: Luca Illetterati

15.30-16.30: Giovanna Pinna, Aesthetic Universalism and the Aestheticization of Politics: On Schiller and Hegel

16.45-17.45: Mario Farina, Hegel: Art and the Critique of Modernity. The Hegelian Roots of the Politicization of Art

20.00: Dinner*

June 9, Sala Bortolami

Chair: Giulia Bernard

9.30-10.30: Kristin Gjesdal, Tradition, Critique, and Agency in Germaine de Staël

10.45-11.45: Francesco Campana, Aesthetics, Politics, and the Novel: The Case of Florentin by Dorothea Mendelssohn-Schlegel

12.15-13.15: Markus Gante, The Politics of Absolute Spirit

13.30 Lunch*

15.00: Visit to the Bo Palace*

Chair: Giovanna Luciano

16.30-17.30: Alberto L. Siani, Artcentrism, Eurocentrism, and the Stakes of Hegelian Aesthetics

17.45-18.45: Paul A. Kottman, The Attention Economy

20.00: Dinner*

June 10, Sala Bortolami

Chair: Elena Nardelli

9.30-10.30: C. Allen Speight, Inscrutability and the Aesthetic

10.45-11.45: Gioia Sili, Resisting Oblivion. Fanny Mendelssohn and the Female Narrative

12.00: Visit to the Padua Baptistery*

13.30 Lunch*

Chair: Giovanna Miolli

15.00-16.00: Italo Debernardi Cárcamo, The Ideal or Artistic Beauty and the Sense of Appearance in Hegel’s Aesthetics

16.15-17.15: Gabriele Schimmenti, Myth after Religion: The Politicization of Myth in Left Hegelianism

17.45-18.45: Gabriele Tomasi, Friendship, Love and Politics. On Hölderlin’s Quest for Community

19.00: Conclusion

20.00: Dinner

*Activities for speakers only

Seminar series: ‘Actualité de la recherche en philosophie allemande classique’ (academinc year 2025/2026)

May 20, 2026, École normale supérieure in Paris (salle des Résistants, 45, rue d’Ulm, Paris 75005)

Organization: Mildred Galland-Szymkowiak et Alexandru David

Discussion of the book: Francesco Campana, The End of Literature, Hegel and the Contemporary Novel, Palgrave Macmillan, 2019

XXIII Annual Conference of the Italian Society for Aesthetics: ‘Estetica e Politica’

28-30 May, 2025 at the University of Bari Aldo Moro.

Participation with the paper: Francesco Campana, ‘Art on the barricades: or, the end of art, but this time actually conceived as the possibility of its death’

For further information and the program, visit this link.

SoSe 2025 Colloquium: Prof. Dr. Francesca Raimondi (Critical Theory and Aesthetics).

May 3, 2025 at the Freie Universität Berlin.

Participation with the paper: Francesco Campana, ‘On Representation: Artistic Space as Political Space’.

International Conference German Idealism and Beyond.

21st February, 2025, at the New School for Social Research (Wolff Conference Room (D1103), 6 East 16th Street, New York City), from 10.00 am to 4.00 pm.

Organization: Agnese di Riccio (New School for Social Research), Giuliano Infantino (University of Stüttgart) and Samuel Lee (New York University).

Participation with the paper: Francesco Campana, ‘Irony and Objectivity in Hegel’s Philosophy
with a commentary by Pablo Pulgar Moya (UDP)

For further information, please visit this link.

New York Aesthetics Lunch Workshop—Spring 2025

CUNY Graduate Center,  365 5^th Ave, New York, NY 10016 (Room 4419) 

January 29, 11.45 – 1.15

Francesco Campana (University of Padua & The New School)

On Representation: Artistic Space as Political Space

Abstract

The demand for perspectives other than the dominant ones in the history of the arts—male, white, heteronormative, Western, bourgeois, etc.—has emerged forcefully in recent decades. This demand calls for the artistic representation of diverse viewpoints, challenges the privileges that have shaped the dominant narratives, and questions traditional canons and claims of universality. The need to artistically represent plural views, in terms of ethnicity, gender, social class, religion, geographic origin, and more, has, to some extent, become intertwined with the need for political representation. In this talk, I will focus on the concept of ‘representation,’ exploring the boundaries, interrelationships, similarities, and differences between artistic and political representation. I will also examine to what extent artistic representation can take on the characteristics of political representation, and how the intersection of these two concepts might contribute to a broader reconsideration of the relationship between art and politics.

Organization: Prof. Elisa Caldarola, within the MSC Project IEIA (grant agreement 101068795).