Between June 25–28, 2025, the International Visual Sociology Association’s community convened in Suwon, South Korea, for its annual conference to explore the theme “Beyond the Image: Addressing Power Dynamics in Visual Scholarship.”

As one component of the conference, IVSA and its affiliate journal, Visual Studies, collaborated to organize an annual exhibition to facilitate dialogue among practitioners and scholars at the intersection of multiple approaches and rationalities. The exhibition invited a collective, critical reflection on what being visually engaged might mean outside the economy of scholarly knowledge and practices. In creating a space where IVSA members, visual social scientists, artists, and practitioners could experiment with visuals, visuality, and visualization (including beyond “the visual” per se through sounds and other media), participants were encouraged to explore how they approached the boundary between (their) scholarship and (their) art.

Through this project, Visual Studies continued a long-entertained idea that had begun with the journal’s 2022 online exhibition “What is an image?”: curating an exhibition aligned with the annual conference theme. In recent years, the journal had expanded its approach to visuals and aesthetics while continuously reflecting on its practices and forms of engagement (for example, formats such as Picture/talks, Visual Essays, and a forthcoming joint issue with the Open Eye Gallery in Liverpool, United Kingdom). While these endeavors allowed Visual Studies to better represent the diversity of visual scholarship, this evolution reflected not so much a long-term strategy as a fast-growing collective commitment toward inclusivity, reflexivity, and experimentation within the journal’s editorial team.

As the IVSA conference expanded toward less writing-centered media of dissemination, including the launch of the dedicated IVSA film festival in 2025, IVSA reaffirmed its commitment to supporting broader recognition of art-based, and at times radically experimental, forms of research.