Text Illuminations is an art installation by artist Nela Milic, University of the Arts London (UAL) produced through inter-disciplinary collaboration with political scientists Denisa Kostovicova, Ivor Sokolic and Tom Paskhalis London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE).

At this event, the artist and political scientists join together to discuss the process of interdisciplinary collaboration that transverses from the rigor of political science method to the unbridled artistic expression focused on the quest for justice and reconciliation after conflict.

Speakers:

Dr Denisa Kostovicova, Dr Ivor Sokolic and Tom Paskhalis, London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), and Dr Nela Milic, University of the Arts London, London College of Communication.

About Text Illuminations

This artwork is an interactive representation of a search for the meaning of reconciliation after mass atrocity through debates including people from all ethnic groups involved in a decade of civil wars in the Balkans. Suspended illuminated letters lend themselves to composition of different words and phrases. A range of letter compositions mirrors stems, lemmas and words, the brightness of their illumination reflects the word probabilities, while their positioning in a three-dimensional space parallels their distance – all of them the staple of the quantitative text analysis originally applied to analyze the patterns of conversations in these dialogues.

Event Series

The event is part of an exhibition, Reconciliations  running in parallel at the Exchange, Bush House, King’s College London from 1 November-1 December 2018, and at the Knapp Gallery, Regent’s University London, from 1 November 2018-19 January 2019. The exhibitions are part of a major AHRC-funded project, ‘Art & Reconciliation: Conflict, Culture and Community’, Art and Reconciliation explored the politics of reconciliation across the Western Balkans and beyond from a variety of perspectives in three strands, History, Discourse and Practice.