Micro-utopias: anthropological perspectives on art, relationality, and creativity.

Abstract

rationale and ContextThe editors began discussing this special issue in 2014 through a serendipitous encounter. Ruy and Maïté were interested in the possibility of promoting an anthropology of utopia, and simultaneously an anthropology as utopia. Alex and Jonas, working on anthropological approaches to contemporary artistic practices, were seeking to develop the theorising potential of relational art. The immanent space of connection was, precisely, the concept of "micro-utopia". In our discussions, several questions, problems, and challenges emerged about the relevance of micro-utopias for an anthropology of art in particular, but also for an anthropological agenda concerned with core themes of the disciplines, among them agency, creativity, and relationality.As editors based in three different continents, we have selected a range of texts that are situated in starkly different fields. We have therefore been faced with challenges of anthropological comparison: how to synthesise distributed anthropological and local expertise? This special issue proposes to render plastic key artistic theories and concepts that help to situate and compare different field sites, with the aim of rethinking core anthropological theory, while also striving to respect the specificities of the contexts and distinct vocabularies of the case studies discussed. In this introduction, we propose a preliminary cartography of the concept of microutopias in art practice and anthropological theory of art. We are, however, wary of sidelining art practice and theory as a sub-discipline or niche area of anthropological inquiry. Instead, we show how micro-utopias -as one example of an ethnographic concept -can feed back into anthropological theory itself and inform some key concepts that have been central to the discipline since its various inceptions.From an anthropological point of view, framing art as a social experience would be sufficient justification for a disciplinary heuristic construction. The anthropology (or rather, an-

A Political Dance in the Rain

“…This brings me back to the potential for a hopeful future for Indonesia that I mentioned at the beginning of this article. It is a consideration of the cinematic practices of komunitas film within the conceptual framework of the 'micro-utopia' that allows me to look at the 'aesthetic realisations and instantiations of struggles' (Blanes et al 2016:10)-of their filmmaking and films-in a way that theoretically grasps my subjective experience of komunitas film as embodying the potential for a hopeful future for Indonesia. From this perspective, the dance does have the potential to change the weather, because the dance creates social spaces and thus makes certain that (some) actors in the microcosmic space of the screening event are touched by the raindrop.…”

“…The scope of my research goes beyond the medium of film, as I am looking at particular 'forms and milieus of artistic production' (Blanes et al 2016:6). Thus, I engage with scholarship that focuses on participatory artistic practices (see Jurriëns 2017;Bourriaud 2002;Blanes et al 2016) and look at komunitas film as reminiscent of 'extra-institutional collectives seeking change' (Blanes et al 2016:10) and 'interventions that propose […] political reconfiguration' (Blanes et al 2016:10). The notion of 'micro-utopia' , taken up in the special issue of Cadernos de Arte e Antropologia (Journal of Art & Anthropology), titled 'Micro-Utopias: Anthropological Perspectives on Art, Relationality and Creativity' and by Jurriëns (2017), who has worked with Indonesian video artists, becomes vital in my conceptualization of the cinematic practices of komunitas film as a form of political action that holds the potential for a hopeful future.…”

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“…As Amit observes, "we often find notions of community offering a convenient conceptual haven, a location from which to safely circumscribe potentially infinite web of connections" (Amit and Rapport, 2002: 17). The risk of naturalising communities in participatory, relational or community-based art projects is to level local collectivities at the expense of more subtle, but not less pertinent, identity dynamics (Crehan 2011;Bishop 2012;Blanes et al 2016). The questions posed by critical approaches to community art practices revolve around what collectivities they address, who is included or left out in these art projects, the relations of power established among the actors involved, and what identity dynamics and conflicts emerge (or are subdued) in these artistic practices.…”

Digitalizing Historical Documents in the Current Disruptive Industrial Era

“…Research on the digitalization of anthropology of art has been conducted in many areas worldwide. The study focuses on micro-perspectives on rationality and creativity in Arts and Anthropology [3]. The other investigations are the contemporary perspectives of digital arts and anthropology [4], the importance of digital anthropology of arts [5], the questioning of the effective channel for digitalizing anthropology of art [6], and the benefits and challenges of digitalization and open access in the area of anthropology of art [7].…”