Special Issues

Arts publishes Special Issues to create collections of papers on specific topics, with the aim of building a community of authors and readers to discuss the latest research and develop new ideas and research directions. Special Issues are led by Guest Editors, who are experts on the topic and all Special Issue submissions follow MDPI's standard editorial process. The journal’s Editor-in-Chief and/or designated Editorial Board Member will oversee Guest Editor appointments and Special Issue proposals, checking their content for relevance and ensuring the suitability of the material for the journal. The papers published in a Special Issue will be collected and displayed on a dedicated page of the journal’s website. Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies and Guest Editor responsibilities can be found here. For any inquiries related to a Special Issue, please contact the Editorial Office.

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Ecocritical Lens: Photography, Environment, and the Anthropocene
edited by Karla McManus
submission deadline 15 May 2026 | Viewed by 2006 | Submission Open
Keywords: eco-photography; art and the Anthropocene; ecocritical art history; material histories of photography; photography studies
Aesthetics in Contemporary Cities submission deadline 30 May 2026 | 7 articles | Viewed by 22606 | Submission Open
Keywords: landscapes of urban spaces; public realm aesthetics; aesthetics in the urban context; street art; aesthetics perception
Performative Imaging: Post-Digital Medialities in Contemporary Moving Image Practices
edited by Gabriel Menotti, and
submission deadline 31 May 2026 | Viewed by 1547 | Submission Open
Keywords: performance; installation; moving image; embodiment; participation; environmental; spatiality; post-digital; archives
Ethnographic Film Cinematography: Capturing Culture and Human Experience Through the Lens
edited by
submission deadline 20 Jun 2026 | Viewed by 479 | Submission Open
Keywords: ethnography; ethnographic film; anthropology; visual anthropology; ethnographic video; cinematography
Creating Musical Experiences
edited by Róisín Blunnie and Orla Flanagan
submission deadline 26 Jun 2026 | 7 articles | Viewed by 9046 | Submission Open
Keywords: music performance; artistic programming; concert design; curating musical experiences; historical and contemporary performance design; collaborative creativity and performance
Film Music
edited by Nick Poulakis
submission deadline 30 Jun 2026 | 2 articles | Viewed by 10168 | Submission Open
Keywords: film music; film sound; cinema; musicology; film studies; cultural studies
Active Women in the Art Market: 1950–2020. Mapping Gallerists, Collectors, Maecenas, Auctioneers, Curators in Emerging Markets submission deadline 30 Jun 2026 | 3 articles | Viewed by 8333 | Submission Open
Keywords: art market; Global South; feminism; female studies; women gallerists; women art dealers; women collectors; women artists; women curators; gender equality
Human-Animal Interactions in Western Art
edited by
submission deadline 30 Jun 2026 | 1 articles | Viewed by 5245 | Submission Open
Keywords: human– animal interactions; art history; animal studies; Western art
The Art of the Brain: Unlocking the Power of Neuroaesthetics in the Age of Artificial Intelligence
edited by
submission deadline 30 Jun 2026 | 1 articles | Viewed by 1558 | Submission Open
Keywords: neuroaesthetics; art and brain; creativity; cognitive function; emotional regulation; artificial intelligence (AI)
Digital Technologies in Visual Arts: Algorithms, AI, and Immersive Media
edited by and
submission deadline 30 Jun 2026 | Viewed by 555 | Submission Open
Keywords: digital technologies; visual arts; algorithms; computational Intelligence; digital aesthetics; immersive media
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Cinema and the Century: Film as a Mirror of Modern Life
edited by André Rui Graça
submission deadline 30 Jun 2026 | Viewed by 235 | Submission Open
Keywords: film studies; creative and cultural industries; film and history; media studies
(This special issue belongs to the Section Film and New Media)
The New Politics of Art: Artworks in an Age of Corporate Globalism
edited by Lenore Metrick-Chen
submission deadline 1 Jul 2026 | Viewed by 474 | Submission Open
Keywords: art; audience; alternative; politics; economics; activism; values; critical theory; equity; transformative; capitalism; resistance
Queerness in 18th- and 19th- Century European Art (2nd Edition)
edited by Andrew Shelton
submission deadline 1 Jul 2026 | Viewed by 458 | Submission Open
Keywords: queer; art history; 18th- and 19th- century
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Music, Gesture, and Embodiment: New Interdisciplinary Perspectives in Gesture–Sound Studies
edited by
submission deadline 15 Jul 2026 | Viewed by 758 | Submission Open
Keywords: embodied music cognition; music and gesture; gesture– sound relationship; gesture analysis; motion capture technologies; multimodality; interdisciplinary approaches; video-based gesture recognition; multimodal interaction; video-based gesture recognition
Ontological Investigations in Visual Art Studies
edited by Lampo Leong and
submission deadline 31 Jul 2026 | Viewed by 317 | Submission Open
Keywords: digital and AI art; immersive installations; contemporary ink; formal elements in visual art; technological innovation in art; ontological approaches in visual art studies; formalistic aesthetics; spiritual expression in art
Contemporary Development of American Film
edited by Catherine L. Benamou and Philana Payton
submission deadline 1 Aug 2026 | Viewed by 949 | Submission Open
Keywords: biopics; film adaptation; independent cinema; film and television labor; social justice; exhibition practices; narrative form; queer/trans representation; marginalized filmmakers; production studies; race/gender/class/sexuality
Divine Visions: A Global Exploration of Devotional Art and Iconography, c. 1200–1700
edited by Katharine Scherff
submission deadline 1 Aug 2026 | Viewed by 573 | Submission Open
Keywords: devotion; iconography; materiality; embodiment; transcultural; performance; multisensory; ritual; representation; sacred
Visible Records: Mapping the Narrative of Vernacular Design
edited by
submission deadline 15 Aug 2026 | Viewed by 227 | Submission Open
Keywords: vernacular design; pluriversal visual languages; design and autonomy; design and power; design and belonging
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Restitution Beyond Repatriation: Rethinking African Tangible Heritage in Twenty-First Century Museums
edited by
submission deadline 31 Aug 2026 | 5 articles | Viewed by 9729 | Submission Open
Keywords: restitution; African art; museum; repatriation; decolonization
Picasso Studies (Third Edition)
edited by Enrique Mallen
submission deadline 31 Aug 2026 | Viewed by 181 | Submission Open
Keywords: Picasso; language; cubism; collage; interdisciplinary
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Visual Culture, Emotion, and the Body in Early Modern Europe
edited by
submission deadline 6 Sep 2026 | Viewed by 592 | Submission Open
Keywords: physicality; anatomy; medium; sensory; embodiment; mortality; emotion; perception; memory; materiality; agency; humanism
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Myths in Art, XV–XVII Centuries submission deadline 30 Sep 2026 | 2 articles | Viewed by 4768 | Submission Open
Keywords: alchemy; allegory; astrology; neo-Platonism; Hermeticism; Renaissance painting; prisca theologia; mythology; humanism; magic
Animals and the Art Academy
edited by Rosemarie McGoldrick and
submission deadline 30 Sep 2026 | Viewed by 526 | Submission Open
Keywords: art; artist; animals; humans; ethics; academy; relational
Twenty-Five Years After Post-Black: Reframing Contemporary African American Art
edited by
submission deadline 30 Sep 2026 | Viewed by 411 | Submission Open
Keywords: African American Art; Contemporary Art; African Diaspora
Gender, Craft, and the Avant-Gardes: Reimagining Artistic Practices in Transcultural Modernisms submission deadline 30 Sep 2026 | Viewed by 303 | Submission Open
Keywords: avant-garde; transculturality; global modernisms; gender; feminism; queer art history; crafts; material culture; critical modernism studies; critical art history
(This special issue belongs to the Section Applied Arts)
Soundspace
edited by Tess Knighton
submission deadline 30 Sep 2026 | Viewed by 38 | Submission Open
Keywords: soundspace; soundscape; urban musicology; sound studies; history of emotions; history of the senses; affective geography; sound studies
Intersecting Dialogues: Contemporary Art and Architecture in the 21st Century
edited by Pablo Meninato and Gregory Marinic
submission deadline 1 Oct 2026 | 2 articles | Viewed by 3888 | Submission Open
Keywords: contemporary art; architecture; interdisciplinarity; art theory; architecture theory
[Re]thinking and Georeferencing Aesthetic: Heritage, Identity and Time
edited by Maria De Fátima Lambert, and
submission deadline 30 Oct 2026 | Viewed by 361 | Submission Open
Keywords: aesthetic as heritage— between me and you and the other; decolonial aesthetic thought: increasing and repairing; georeferenced aesthetic systems— analysing; reviewing beliefs; reviewing feminist aesthetic thought; revisiting aesthetic and cultural heritage; revising principles; canons and stereotypes; restoring women philosophers for aesthetic historiography; temporality of aesthetic systems— categories and insurrections
Creativity and Reading in Digital Photography
edited by Rebecca Howard
submission deadline 30 Oct 2026 | Viewed by 195 | Submission Open
Keywords: photographic materiality; new materialism; generative photography; tactile image-making; photo-object; post-digital photography
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Ornament Now: Re-Thinking Ornament in Art, Philosophy, and Everyday Life
edited by
submission deadline 31 Oct 2026 | Viewed by 560 | Submission Open
Keywords: ornamentation; repetition; rhythm; material culture; architecture; craft; digital design; ecology; assemblage; everyday aesthetics; affect; pattern; bio-art
Art and the Environment
edited by
submission deadline 31 Oct 2026 | Viewed by 114 | Submission Open
Keywords: art and the environment; ecocritical art; art history
Photography, Civil Society and the Crisis of Democracy
edited by Terri Weissman
submission deadline 15 Nov 2026 | Viewed by 514 | Submission Open
Keywords: photography & democratic crisis; photography & justice; surveillance & sousveillance; photography & evidence; post-truth media; photography & collective action
Asian Diaspora and Mobility in Arts and Visual Culture
edited by Boreth Ly and Michelle Yee
submission deadline 15 Nov 2026 | Viewed by 287 | Submission Open
Keywords: diaspora; displacement; labor; gender; sexuality; homeland; mobility; nation; modern and contemporary art; material culture; visual culture; art history; performance; film
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Conditions of Transcultural Curating: Ecology, Decoloniality, and Global Exhibition Practices
edited by Marianna Tsionki
submission deadline 30 Nov 2026 | Viewed by 533 | Submission Open
Keywords: transcultural curating; ecological aesthetics; decolonial exhibition practices; global art circulation; more-than-human perspectives
Relationships Between Biological Diversity and Art: Exploring the Intersection
edited by , Aixa Ofelia Rivero-Guerra and Estrella Alfaro Saiz
submission deadline 30 Nov 2026 | Viewed by 480 | Submission Open
Keywords: artistic expressions; biodiversity conservation; design; ecocriticism; illustration; motifs; symbology; contemporary art
Synagogue Architecture and Art: New Horizons submission deadline 20 Dec 2026 | Viewed by 333 | Submission Open
Keywords: synagogue architecture; synagogue art; Jewish ritual spaces; Jewish art; ritual architecture and art
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Anxiety and Influence: Rethinking Western Art Music in the 21st Century
edited by Erinn E. Knyt
submission deadline 30 Dec 2026 | Viewed by 248 | Submission Open
Keywords: adaptation; globalism; 21st century; western art music; artificial intelligence; musical canon
(This special issue belongs to the Section Musical Arts and Theatre)
Latin American Photography
edited by Nathanial Eli Gardner and Carmen Fernandez Galán Montemayor
submission deadline 31 Dec 2026 | Viewed by 241 | Submission Open
Keywords: Latin American photography; visual theory; visual literacy; semiotics and photography; text and image
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Revisioning Cinema: The History of Japan on Screen
edited by Sean O'Reilly
submission deadline 28 Feb 2027 | Viewed by 59 | Submission Open
Keywords: Japanese cinema; revisionism; film history; denialism
Perspectives of Acoustics
edited by
submission deadline 1 Mar 2027 | Viewed by 282 | Submission Open
Keywords: psychoacoustics; auditory perception; architectural acoustics; sound art; immersive technologies; audio engineering; ambisonics; VR/AR audio; sound aesthetics; music production
The Study of Animation Art
edited by Daniela Sirbu
submission deadline 1 Mar 2027 | Viewed by 196 | Submission Open
Keywords: animation aesthetics; animation history; animation theory; animation narrative; immersive animation; interactive animation; game animation; projection mapping; AR; VR; visual effects
Film at the Crossroads of Media and Art submission deadline 30 Mar 2027 | Viewed by 209 | Submission Open
Keywords: film and media art; interactive film; expanded cinema; post-cinema; intermediality; digital film aesthetics; cinematic installation; transmedia storytelling; art and technology; hybrid moving image; contemporary film theory
(This special issue belongs to the Section Film and New Media)
Cinema and Censorship submission deadline 1 Apr 2027 | Viewed by 302 | Submission Open
Keywords: cinema; censorship; film regulation; self-censorship; film history; global cinema; media governance; political cinema; authoritarian culture; digital platforms; OTT streaming; postcolonial cinema; gender and film
(This special issue belongs to the Section Film and New Media)
Site and Sight: The Significance of Place in Contemporary Art and Theory
edited by Vanessa Corby
submission deadline 1 Jun 2027 | Viewed by 22 | Submission Open
Keywords: site; place; spectacle; local; global; dwelling; human; non-human
(This special issue belongs to the Section Visual Arts)
Artivism—Affecting Change Through the Arts
edited by , Syrus Marcus Ware and
submission deadline 30 Jun 2027 | Viewed by 245 | Submission Open
Keywords: art; social challenges; social movements; affect; activism
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