Geopolitics + Art

Geopolitics deals with interactions between politics and geographic territory. These interactions, when subjected to extreme force and abuse of power, become synonymous with conflicts that lead — as we are seeing today — to the migration of populations, the hardening of borders, and the instituting of various forms of surveillance. 

It is difficult for art, when inserted into this context, to disregard these tensions that spontaneously call for activist practices. Some of these practices are analyzed in our thematic section, which underlines the dominance of politics over geography when it comes to the rights of Indigenous peoples, the indiscriminate force of globalization, the usurpation of nature by mechanisms of power, and the gentrification that leads to homogenization of populations. We also see how symbolic borders and historically meaningful regions, such as the Green Line in Beirut and the Canadian Far North, spur artists to propose a rereading of history beyond the usual signposts of the dominant discourse.