publications

THINKING LIKE AN ARTIST RESEARCHER ABOUT WAR

• Journal: Millennium, Vol 45, Issue 2
• Author/Editor: Jill Gibbon and Christine Sylvester
• ISBN: 10.1177/0305829816684261
• Year of Publication: 2017
• Pages: 7 
• Binding: Soft
• Illustrations: One

This is an article published in Millennium, Journal of International Relations, coauthored with Christine Sylvester, Professor of Political Science at the University of Connecticut. Using drawings that I have made undercover in arms fairs as a starting point, the article explores the potential of art as a method to research war. We argue that the international arms trade is made respectable largely through aesthetics. The drawings show the ways in which arms fairs are aesthetic events, seducing the senses through hospitality, dress, food, fine wine, and music. These aspects are overlooked by most research into the arms trade as the Political Sciences are based on logic and reason, approaches that cannot convey sensuous experience. However, while art is well placed to research aesthetic aspects of war, it also raises problems. Art is ambiguous; the meaning of a drawing changes in different contexts. So, we argue for interdisciplinary research that combines aesthetic and academic methods, and stress that this requires new forms of dissemination.

The article steps outside conventions of academic writing by taking the form of a conversation, broken up by a security guard at the end. It is part of a special edition exploring ‘the aesthetic turn’ in International Political Theory. Christine Sylvester is a key figure in this methodological shift in the emphasis she places on personal experiences of war in contrast to classical realist approaches. The edition is introduced by Roland Bleiker, author of a seminal text (2001) calling for the use of aesthetic methods in the Political Sciences. The article contributes to debates about art and politics, aesthetic aspects of war, and art as a transferable method of research.