Challenges of Re-politicisation

Abstract

The relation between politics and art is increasingly debated within contemporary political philosophy and critical theory. This article focuses on Chantal Mouffe's negotiation of this relation, which forms an integral part of her agonistic pluralist project. In particular, it aims at critically exploring the role of artistic practices in re-politicising a largely de-politicised, post-democratic public space. What are the challenges such a re-politicisation poses? However, although re-politicisation can be the only response to post-democracy, it needs to avoid its own absolutisation/idealisation. From a radical democratic point of view, the need for re-politicisation is thus a need for a post-utopian, self-critical, cautious, agonistic re-politicisation. What is the role artistic practices can play in this enterprise? Recent art projects by Antony Gormley and William Kentridge are presented and discussed in order to illuminate the political relevance of contemporary art. They both seem to embody elements central in Mouffe's agonistic pluralism and can also develop it in new directions.