Tanja Zimmermann

Professor Tanja Zimmermann holds the Professorship for Art History with a focus on Eastern, Central and Southeastern European art and its intercultural relations at Leipzig University. Her office is located at Wünschmannnshof, Dittrichring 18-20, Room 5/07, Leipzig. She currently leads two major research projects: the International Research Training Group 'Belongings: Jewish Material Culture in Twentieth-Century Europe and Beyond' (funded by DFG since October 2024) and 'On the Reassessment of Naive Art' (funded by the Fritz Thyssen Foundation, 2022-2025/2026).

Her research interests span the art history of Eastern, Central and Southeastern Europe with particular focus on naive art, Balkan studies, Jewish material culture, Russian/Soviet art history, Yugoslav cultural history, and visual orality as a media system. Her work examines the political-aesthetic negotiation processes between abstract and figurative-objective art movements during periods of upheaval, particularly through the lens of naive art exhibitions in interwar and postwar periods.

Zimmermann's publication record demonstrates remarkable consistency from 1993 to 2025, with her most recent work exploring topics such as the kinetic perception of Saint Petersburg, Ulrike Ottinger's multimedia works, the transformation of Catherine the Great as a German-Russian icon, and the political dimensions of naive art. Her research shows a clear trajectory from early work on Slovenian wall painting to increasingly complex analyses of cultural intersections in Eastern European contexts.

She actively participates in academic discourse through numerous lectures and conference presentations, with recent engagements at the University of Salzburg, Central European University Budapest, and the University of Helsinki. Her scholarly activities demonstrate sustained engagement with the complex cultural histories of Eastern Europe, particularly examining how art functions within political transitions and identity formation.