Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA), in association with Curatorial Practice, Monash Art, Design and Architecture (MADA), are pleased to present a special illustrated lecture by Claire Bishop: Déjà vu: Contemporary art and the ghosts of modernity. The lecture will be introduced and convened by Tara McDowell.

One of the most persistent themes in contemporary art since the early 1990s has been that of ‘ruined modernity’ and ‘failed utopias’. This type of art reformats iconic examples of twentieth-century architecture and design into other mediums (painting, sculpture, photography, video, slide shows, archival installations, etc). Bishop’s lecture offers a critique of this tendency: it argues for the digital underpinnings of this strategy of reformatting; discusses the institutional reasons for the rise of this historicism; and asks how we might imagine more politicised modes of engagement with twentieth-century modernism.