Socialist Anthropocene in the Visual Arts

07/09/2026

Progressive Heritage Committee

Based at the School of History and Art History at the University of East Anglia and with support from the Getty Foundation Connecting Art Histories initiative, the research project Progressive Heritage: Reappraising State Art Collections of World Socialism is launching an open call for participants to form its roving committee.

Led by Dr. Maja Fowkes and Dr. Reuben Fowkes, the project sets out to engage a new generation of research curators, collection custodians and art historians working with state collections in a collective inquiry to reconsider the progressive heritage of socialist art.

The Progressive Heritage Committee will confer on the best practices for revalorizing artworks produced and collected during state socialism, as a challenging heritage that is nevertheless worth preserving, studying and exhibiting.

Each of the committee meetings is conceived as a week-long gathering to be held in Addis Ababa in Ethiopia, Tallinn in Estonia and Almaty in Kazakhstan. The committee’s findings will be presented at a concluding symposium on the revalorization of socialist art at University of East Anglia.

Applications are sought from curators, collection custodians and researchers working with state collections of socialist art in the focus regions. Of relevance here are the art collections of state museums, but also those of academies of art, house museums, industrial enterprises, art directorates, etc.

Travel, accommodation and subsistence costs will be covered and participants must commit to attending all meetings for the full duration.

Selection of the participants will be made based on the application and short online interview by the project team comprising Dr. Maja Fowkes (UEA) , Dr. Reuben Fowkes (UEA) , Berhanu Ashagrie Deribew (Alle School of Fine Arts and Design, Addis Ababa University) .ashagrie and Jakub Gawkowski (Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź) . We aim to notify applicants of the outcomes by the end of October 2026.

To apply and for more information see: https://www.uea.ac.uk/about/school-of-history-and-art-history/history/our-research/research-projects-and-centres

Courtesy Tadesse Mesfin, photo Maja Fowkes.

01/07/2026

Excited to announce a keynote lecture by Maja and Reuben Fowkes on ‘Progressive Heritage: Socialist Art as a Repository of Environmental History’ at the Conference on Art in Society at the University of Zagreb, starting today and running from 1–4 July 2026!

This lecture proposes that recognising officially commissioned artworks from former socialist countries entails looking beyond ideological unease to examine how socialist art testifies to the alterity of the past system, preserving the ethos of its self-proclaimed progressive culture of values and agenda centred around international solidarity and social emancipation.

In re-evaluating this disputed heritage, the lecture focuses on what it reveals about the social and environmental transformations that forged the system. What do such official art practices reveal about socialist expansionism into Indigenous lands, what can be learned from depictions of the infrastructure around extractive industries, and how might the eco-socialist threads of the past be followed in new directions?

The lecture will take place on Thursday, 2 July at 14:10.

Full programme details available here: https://artins.ffzg.unizg.hr/programme/

27/05/2026

Snapshots from the second day of the SAVA Conference: Solidarity with Nature

Thank you to all our speakers and everyone who joined the conversation! Through a series of brilliant paper presentations and follow-up exchanges, we explored the ecological heritage of socialism, the role of artists in environmental movements, and how experimental practices can perform beyond-human solidarities.

It was an incredibly generative event, with a wide range of papers bringing new insights to the environmental art histories of global socialisms, and we look forward to continuing these conversations again soon!

27/05/2026

Snapshots from the first day of the SAVA Conference: Solidarity with Nature

Thank you to all our speakers and everyone who joined the conversation! Through a series of brilliant paper presentations and follow-up exchanges, we explored the ecological heritage of socialism, the role of artists in environmental movements, and how experimental practices can perform beyond-human solidarities.

It was an incredibly generative event, with a wide range of papers bringing new insights to the environmental art histories of global socialisms, and we look forward to continuing these conversations again soon!

19/05/2026

SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature
21-22 May 2026
Sainsbury Centre UEA

Join us for the presentation 'Ethereal Ecologies: Socialist Anthropocene of the Sky’ by Maja and Reuben Fowkes, which considers the extent to which the atmosphere was subject to anthropogenic change by examining the sky in socialist realist art and exploring how artists projected alternative, escapist visions onto the atmosphere.

Full programme on sava.earth via link in bio.



Photo: Socialist Anthropocene in Uzbekistan workshop with Davra Collective, supported by British Council, Robert Avakyan, Icarus, 1981, House of Aviators, Tashkent.

18/05/2026

SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature
21-22 May 2026
Sainsbury Centre UEA

We're excited to introduce the sixth panel of the SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature! This panel brings together presentations by Ng Mei Jia (NTU Centre for Contemporary Art, Singapore), Ingrid Ruudi (Institute of Art History, Estonian Academy of Arts), and Joanna Sokołowska (University of Wrocław).

Explore the full programme on sava.earth!



1. Võ An Khánh, Making the Nam Can mangrove forest green again after the Americans sprayed the toxic chemicals, 1970, re-printed 2020, inkjet print on paper. Courtesy National Gallery Singapore.
2. Vaike Lubi's building (1980s, photographer unknown, Estonian Museum of Architecture).
3. Mona Vătămanu & Florin Tudor: Gagarin's Tree /Copacul lui Gagarin, 2016, film still.

18/05/2026

Please join us for the SAVA Conference on SOLIDARITY WITH NATURE: ENVISIONING THE ECOLOGICAL HERITAGE OF WORLD SOCIALISM 21-22 May 2026, Sainsbury Art Centre Lecture Theatre
University of East Anglia www.sava.earth

The SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature asks how art history could be unlocked as a repository of the ecological heritage of socialism, explores the role of art practitioners in environmental movements, and considers how experimental art practices performed beyond-human solidarities and expanded the system’s ecological horizons.

Conference registration is free of charge, but please email [email protected] to let us know that you plan to attend.

PROGRAMME

Thursday 21 May
09.45 Conference registration
10.00 Introduction to the Socialist Anthropocene
The SAVA Team

PANEL I: NATURE PROTECTION
Chaired by Maja Fowkes (SAVA UEA)
10.30 Daniel Grúň (Institute of Art History, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava)
Ecological Solidarity and Planetary Thought: Activist–Artist Interactions in Late Socialist Czechoslovakia
11.00 Megija Mīlberga (Institute of Fine Arts, New York University)
“Where will you sleep? Under the spruce!” The Great-Tree Liberation Group and counterpublic environmentalism in Soviet Latvia
11.30 Preeti Kathuria (Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna)
Stubble Burning and Rural Ecologies: Contemporary Artistic Interventions in India

12.00 Discussion

12.30 Lunch

PANEL II: SYSTEM ECOLOGIES
Chaired by Meg Bernstein (UEA)
13.30 Anna Pronina (Central European University, Vienna)
Seeing the Socialist Subtropics in Soviet Uzbekistan
14.00 Nikola Bojić (Academy of Fine Arts, Zagreb)
Diagramming the Socialist Anthropocene
14.30 Peter Szalay (Comenius University Bratislava)
Between Pannaturalistic Socialism and Degrowth
15.00 Discussion
15.30 Coffee break

PANEL III: ENVIRONMENTAL PRAXES
Chaired by Reuben Fowkes (SAVA UEA)
16.00 Pavlína Morganová (Academy of Fine Arts, Prague)
Out of Town – Land Art and ordinary Life in Czechoslovakia in 1970s
16.30 Tihomir Topuzovski (Museum of Contemporary Art, Skopje)
De/Territorializing Nature: Socio-Ecological Assemblages in Yugoslav and Post-Yugoslav Contexts
17.00 Dominicus Zimanimoto Makukula(University of Dar es Salaam)
‘Ujamaa’ Art Remnants in Tanzania: A Critical Review of Selected Murals and Monuments in Dar es Salaam
17.30 Discussion
18.00 End

Friday 22 May
10.00 Ethereal Ecologies: Socialist Anthropocene of the Sky
Maja and Reuben Fowkes (SAVA UEA)
PANEL IV: ANTHROPOCENE COSMOLOGIES
Chaired by Sorcha Thomson (SAVA UEA)
10.30 Lia Dostlieva (artist, cultural anthropologist, and essayist)
Soviet Anthropocene 1933
11.00 Christian Sorace (University of Cambridge) & Rebecca Empson (UCL)
Lenin on the Steppe: Ecologies of Infinity
11.30 Anel Rakhimzhanova (New York University)
18,000 Worlds: Towards a Theory of Re-montage
12.00 Discussion
12.30 Lunch

PANEL V: ECO-SPIRTUALIST TENDENCIES
Chaired by Makar Tereshin (SAVA UEA)
13.30 Eva Skopalová (National Gallery, Prague)
Bird in Space: Sculpture and Ecological Imagination in 1960s Czechoslovakia
14.00 Shirin Melikova (Azerbaijan National Museum of Art, Baku)
Non-conformist Art and the Ecological Critique of Late Socialism in Azerbaijan
14.30 Cristian Nae (George Enescu National University of the Arts, Iasi)
Of Earth and Plants: Ecological Posthumanism in Romanian Art of the 1980s
15.00 Discussion
15.30 Coffee break

PANEL VI: ECOCENTRIC IMAGINARIES
Chaired by Marleen Boschen (Tate Modern)
16.00 Ng Mei Jia (NTU Centre for Contemporary Art, Singapore)
The Socialist Word for Freedom is (Mangrove) Forest
16.30 Ingrid Ruudi (Institute of Art History, Estonian Academy of Arts)
Vaike Lubi and her 'stick palaces': eco-feminist crip resistance in Late Soviet Estonia
17.00 Joanna Sokołowska (University of Wrocław)
Socialist Pasts for Planetary Futures: Art as a Cosmopolitical Practice in Post-socialist Central and Eastern Europe
For abstracts and speaker biographies please see:
https://sava.earth/conference/solidarity-with-nature-envisioning-the-ecological-heritage-of-world-socialism/

This conference is organised within the framework of the research project Socialist Anthropocene in the Visual Arts (SAVA) led by Dr. Maja Fowkes at the School of History and Art History, University of East Anglia, supported by European Research Council (ERC) and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI).

10.30    Daniel Grúň (Institute of Art History, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava)Ecological Solidarity and Planetary Thought: Activist–Artist Interactions in Late Socialist Czechoslovakia

17/05/2026

SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature
21-22 May 2026
Sainsbury Centre UEA

We're excited to introduce the fifth panel of the SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature! This panel brings together presentations by Eva Skopalová (National Gallery, Prague), Shirin Melikova (Azerbaijan National Museum of Art, Baku), and Cristian Nae (George Enescu National University of the Arts, Iasi).

Explore the full programme on sava.earth via link in bio.



1. Jana Olexová, Seabed, 1967 © Národní galerie Praha, 2026.
2. Tofig Javadov (1925 –1963) In the Workshop. 1961. Oil on canvas. 134x105 cm. From the collection of the Azerbaijan National Museum of Art.
3. Wanda Mihuleac, "Moebius Band", 1978-1982, reproduced on the cover of Octavian Nemescu's music vinyl LP Gradeatia-Natural, produced by Electrecord in 1984.

16/05/2026

SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature
21-22 May 2026
Sainsbury Centre UEA

We're excited to introduce the fourth panel of the SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature! This panel brings together presentations by Lia Dostlieva (artist, cultural anthropologist, and essayist), rebecca empson (UCL) & christian sorace (University of Cambridge), and Anel Rakhimzhanova (New York University).

Explore the full programme on sava.earth!



1. Soviet Anthropocene 1933’ exhibition view, CK Zamek, Poznan, Poland, 2022. Photo by M.Kaczyński.
2. Lenin in Exile (1970), by Ü. Yadamsüren, Gouache on canvas, 69 x 59, National Gallery of Mongolia.
3. Saodat Ismailova. As We Fade, 2024. Courtesy of the artist.

15/05/2026

SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature
21-22 May 2026
Sainsbury Centre UEA

We're excited to introduce the third panel of the SAVA Conference on Solidarity with Nature! This panel brings together presentations by Pavlína Morganová (Academy of Fine Arts, Prague), Tihomir Topuzovski (Museum of Contemporary Art, Skopje), and Dominicus Zimanimoto Makukula (University of Dar es Salaam).

Explore the full programme on sava.earth!



1. Milan Kozelka, Suspension, 1980. Photo: Tomáš Tlustý.
2. Detail of the landfill, Lojane Mine. Photo: Dejan Saraginovski 2023.
3. 'Ujamaa' by Francis Kiure Msangi, 1967. Woodcut print 'Ujamaa.' Photo: E. Court.