Scenes of the Avant-Garde

The history of the avant-garde, told in a series of non-linear tableaus.

This volume understands “avant-garde” as a constellation of moments, emphasizing its plural developments and its crucial interventionist role in culture and politics. Challenging the narrative of a linear avant-garde, the book sheds light on local scenes shaped by their distance from artistic practices and sociocultural conditions of their time. Scenes of the Avant-Garde brings together papers from a conference held in Tbilisi on the occasion of the centenary of the Futurist and Dadaist group H2SO4 (1924).

The contributions explore networks, relationships, and collaborations in artistic interventions. What transformational power lies in these practices? What are the gendered, social, and spatial structures, within which artistic groups test and create forms of community? And what can we learn from these overlooked or differently read stories?

The book offers new insights into avant-garde histories, drawing on case studies from countries such as Georgia, Algeria, India, Poland, Czechoslovakia, France, and the United Kingdom.