Dr. Seraina Renz

Seraina Renz is an art historian and curator. Her research and teaching focus is on art from Central Europe. She is particularly interested in performance and conceptual art of the 1960s and 1970s, as well as in the artistic exchange and transfer of ideas that took place across bloc borders during the Cold War. Before taking up the position of Research Assistant at the Bibliotheca Hertziana in 2021, she was an adjunct lecturer at various universities and colleges (including Université de Fribourg, University of Zurich, Zurich University of the Arts, Bern University of the Arts). In 2016–2019, she was a research assistant at the Chair of Modern and Contemporary Art at the University of Zurich. She completed her PhD in 2015 as part of the research project Conflicting Identities – Politics of Representation and Counterculture in Yugoslavia during the Cold War with Philip Ursprung (ETH Zurich, 2013 –2016), and the monograph was published in 2018 under the title Kunst als Entscheidung. Performance– und Konzeptkunst der 1970er Jahre am Studentischen Kulturzentrum Belgrad. One of her research interests, which she has pursued since receiving her PhD, is the relationship between humans and animals in contemporary art and philosophy. In addition to her academic work, she has co–curated several exhibitions, including at the Kunstmuseum Bern and the Stadtgalerie Bern.