Aims & Scope
21: Inquiries into Art, History, and the Visual – Beiträge zur Kunstgeschichte und visuellen Kultur is a multilingual, double-blind peer-reviewed journal published open access (Diamond). Founded in September 2019, the journal represents a new forum for art history, embracing the full range of diverse objects, questions, and methodologies that comprise and enrich the discipline. The title of the journal indicates the intent to expand the boundaries of traditional art history by integrating all methodologies and subject matter related to images and visual phenomena around the globe. The journal seeks to publish methodologically and theoretically rigorous contributions that can claim relevance for their topic beyond exemplary single-case studies. Access figures are rising continuously: currently, more than 50,000 downloads/year (the most-read article has been downloaded around 5,500 times to date) and the broad geographical spectrum of accesses, which have so far been registered from 150 different countries, testify to the success and growing reputation of the journal. The multilingualism of the discipline is reflected in the journal as much as possible: so far, contributions have been published in English, German, French, Italian, and Spanish, but other languages are equally welcome. In the review section of the journal, exhibitions and books are preferably reviewed in a language other than the original. The vision of the journal’s founder – to design a layout for 21: Inquiries with its own typeface that can be read equally well on computer screens, tablets, and smartphones – has been realized by Kaj Lehmann (Zurich).
Authors’ rights
Our authors retain copyright to their texts and full publishing rights without restriction; “Author Processing Charges” (APCs) are not levied. Individual issues and contributions are generally published under the license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 unless this license has to be modified for specific issues or contributions due to restrictions imposed by institutions holding image rights.
Open Access Publication
21: Inquiries has been published since the beginning as an open-access eJournal in cooperation with the digital art history resource arthistoricum.net (sponsored by the German Research Foundation, DFG) and with technical support from Heidelberg University Library. Four issues are published annually which are available free of charge via the eJournals platform of arthistoricum.net. As a scholar-led journal 21: Inquiries is archived at arthistoricum.net/Heidelberg University Library and currently indexed in DOAJ, EBSCO, ERIH PLUS (European Reference Index for the Humanities and Social Sciences), and WorldCat (OCLC). Long-term archiving is guaranteed by the German National Library; bibliographic data is disseminated via DataCite.
Peer Review
Submitted contributions will be evaluated by the Editorial Board and checked for plagiarism with Turnitin before a double-blind peer review by two external experts. Suggestions for reviewers by the authors cannot be considered. The Editorial Board will decide on the publication based on the peer reviewers’ recommendations. Authors will be informed, within six months of submission, about whether their contribution has been accepted for publication and which changes may need to be incorporated. The final version will be copyedited by the Editorial Team before typesetting. Reviews and contributions to the "Debate" section are not peer-reviewed.
Publication Ethics
The Editorial Board, the Editorial Team and authors of 21: Inquiries are committed to complying with the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).
Editorial Board
The journal’s Editorial Board is comprised of art historians from Europe, Asia, Latin America, and the USA. In addition, the journal has an international Advisory Board that represents essential subfields of the entire history of art in a global perspective.
Editorial Team
21: Inquiries’s issues are managed and prepared by the Editorial Team at the University of Bern: Katharina Böhmer, Alessandra Fedrigo, Joanne Luginbühl, Lia Schüpbach, and Lisa Leimer.
Get involved
The Editorial Board looks forward to your support. It welcomes submissions covering all subfields to establish the international open access eJournal 21: Inquiries for the discipline of art history: Send us your submissions and manuscripts and your feedback and suggestions! If you are interested in regular news, check out our website, subscribe to our newsletter, and follow us on Bluesky and on Instagram. We look forward to hearing from you!