16:00: February 10, 2023: Book Launch and Panel Discussion

Imperial War Museum, Lambeth Road, London, SE1 6HZ

Please arrive at 16.00 at the main entrance, where you will be greeted and escorted to the Orpen Board Room.

We are pleased to invite you to the UK launch of Shona Illingworth: Topologies of Air (Sternberg Press & The Power Plant, 2022). For this event, Shona will be joined by Anthony Downey, Conor Gearty KC (Hon), Nick Grief, Andrew Hoskins, Matt Lee and Catherine Loveday for a roundtable discussion about the book and upcoming events related to the Airspace Tribunal.

Informed by Illingworth’s long-term investigations into individual and societal amnesia, and cultural erasure, Shona Illingworth: Topologies of Air (2022) critically examines the devastating psychological and environmental impacts of military, industrial and corporate transformations of airspace and outer space. Through the development of a proposed new human right, the project is closely connected to the Airspace Tribunal, a series of international public hearings that brought together diverse disciplines, epistemologies and lived experiences to develop the proposal for a new human right to protect the freedom to live without physical or psychological threat from above.

16:30: Introduction by Shona Illingworth and Nick Grief

16:40: Presentation of the book by Anthony Downey

16:50 Panel Discussion, chaired by Andrew Hoskins with responses from Conor Gearty, Matt Lee, Catherine Loveday, and Anthony Downey

17:20: Questions and Discussion

18: 00: Drinks

Speaker Biographies

Shona Illingworth is a Danish-Scottish artist and Professor of Art, Film and Media at the University of Kent. Anthony Downey is Professor of Visual Culture in the Middle East and North Africa at Birmingham City University. Conor Gearty KC (Hon) is Professor of Human Rights Law at the London School of Economics and a barrister at Matrix Chambers, as well as Vice-President for Social Sciences at the British Academy. Andrew Hoskins is Professor of Global Security at the University of Glasgow. Nick Grief is Emeritus Professor of Law at the University of Kent and formerly practised as a barrister from Doughty Street Chambers, London, where he is now an Honorary Associate Tenant. Matt Lee is a film historian and Head of Film at the Imperial War Museums. Catherine Loveday is Professor of Neuropsychology at the University of Westminster, London.

Read “Calculating Skies: Topologies of Air and the Airspace Tribunal", an essay by Anthony Downey on Shona Illingworth’s practice.

Shona Illingworth: Topologies of Air, Book Launch and Panel Discussion