In this project we ask how the relationship of politics and aesthetic experience in Western European post-war cinema can be conceptualized. During the first grant period (2007–2010) we looked primarily at auteur cinema. Now, from 2011-2014, we shall investigate the genre films that also dominated Western European cinema after World War II.

Under the title “The politics of aesthetics in Western European cinema"—this project is part of the collaborative research center (SFB—Sonderforschungsbereich) 626 “Aesthetic experience and the dissolution of artistic limits” based at the Free University Berlin and has been under the direction of Prof. Hermann Kappelhoff since 2007.