Dissonant Legacies: Engaging with Difficult University Heritage
Reflections on Difficult Past through Art
Art relates to dissonant heritage in many different ways: it bears witness to events we would prefer to forget, it can amplify controversial values through works of propaganda, but it can also offer tools to critically reinterpret difficult legacies. Universities have developed different practices to manage this heritage, from commissioning paintings that commemorate traumatic events to preserving works from authoritarian regimes as historical documents, thus promoting critical engagement with the past rather than its celebration.
