Keynote address by Seán Kissane, Curator of Exhibitions, Irish Museum of Modern Art. The lecture will be followed by a moderated discussion.

Lund University’s Department of Arts and Culture Sciences is delighted to partner with the Embassy of Ireland, Stockholm and the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) on a keynote lecture by IMMA’s Curator, Seán Kissane on the museum’s landmark research project and exhibition: Self-Determination: A Global Perspective. The project explored the powerful role of art in nation-building and self-determination across states that gained independence after World War I. Spanning three years, Self-Determination: A Global Perspective examined how art shapes public sentiment and cultural identity through a process of academic inquiry, global collaboration, and shared insights among researchers, artists, curators, and thinkers.

The exhibition traced common cultural strategies across various new nation-states, including Ukraine, Finland, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Egypt, Turkey, and Ireland, set against the international self-determination movement. How did different countries envision state formation? How did their artists and poets conceptualise it? How does this resonate within an international framework? And how do today’s artists engage with these legacies? This lecture introduces the project’s genesis, research questions, and collaborative processes, focusing on the dynamic interplay between official and unofficial cultural narratives. Case studies from Ireland, Latvia, Estonia, and beyond reveal how each country leveraged art and culture to pursue political and cultural sovereignty.

The lecture will be followed by a moderated discussion. 

All are welcome!