Call for Papers:

“Performing Conflict. Theatre, Art, and Performative Media Forms in Wars and Protests”
For the Artivism (Media Activism, Network as Art) section of an issue of the journal Connessioni remote (Remote Connections)
https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/connessioniremote/announcement/view/1007

Deadline for submission of abstracts: March 10, 2026
Deadline for submission of full papers: May 10, 2026

Contemporary wars, conflicts, and political protests exist in a condition that is increasingly inseparable from their representations. Current media and artistic ecosystems do not merely influence how these phenomena circulate but actively shape the very ways in which struggle is enacted.

Performance is no longer simply a “medium” through which violence, dissent, suffering, and resistance are seen, felt, and understood. Rather, performativity has become fully embedded in the operational dimension of contemporary conflicts. It is therefore increasingly necessary to explore the status of performance beyond the paradigm that considers it solely as a mediator or as a means of processing and metabolizing violence.

This issue of Connessioni Remote invites contributions that investigate artistic and media representations of conflict, war, and protest, with particular attention to the entanglement of performative practices, images, platforms, and political imaginaries. We welcome interdisciplinary perspectives that examine how conflicts are made visible, framed, contested, and re-mediated through theatre and the performing arts, as well as through performative actions unfolding across digital and legacy media.

Rather than treating images and performances as mere forms of documentation or illustration, this issue foregrounds their role as active agents of confrontation, as well as their capacity to shape public discourse, mobilization, memory, and responsibility.

KEY THEMES AND AREAS OF INTEREST

We invite original contributions that may include, but are not limited to, the following topics:

• Theatre and performance as sites of public and political intervention in relation to war
• Performative practices developed under conditions of violence, censorship, and displacement
• Theatrical works engaging critically with media imagery, historical trauma, and contemporary geopolitical crises
• Artivism, artists’ activism, and aesthetics of dissent addressing historical and ongoing conflicts
• Visual and performative politics of protest
• Performative responses to war, genocide, and forced displacement
• Theatre as testimony in conflict zones
• Artists as public actors: intervening in war discourse beyond the stage
• Performative actions on social media and digital platforms addressing conflict
• Theatrical spaces as sites of refuge, memory, and solidarity
• War photography, video, and other forms of visual witnessing
• Media narratives of war across film, television, and podcasts
• Micropolitical forms of resistance in vernacular media cultures
• Synthetic and AI-generated imagery in war imaginaries

SUBMISSIONS

Abstracts (400–500 words), accompanied by a reference list and a short author bio (not included in the word count), must be submitted by 10 March 2026 to: rivistaconnessioni.remote@gmail.com.

A maximum of ten proposals will be selected for publication. Full articles, with a length of 30,000 to 40,000 characters (excluding notes and bibliography), must be submitted via the journal’s platform by 10 May 2026.

Expected publication date of the issue: September 2026.

Connessioni Remote is an open access journal and does not charge Article Processing Charges (APC) or any other publication fees.

ABOUT CONNESSIONI REMOTE (REMOTE CONNECTIONS)

Please visit https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/connessioniremote/about