Staff Profile

Background

I was born in Puebla (Mexico) where I studied in a German school for 15 years before taking some time off and then studying a BA in Communication Sciences and a certificate in Literature at the University of the Americas-Puebla, Mexico. After working in hospitality and retail, I worked as an editor for a film production company. I also contributed to the making of documentaries about urban cultures in Mexico City, the Afro-Mexican population of Tierra Caliente in the state of Guerrero, Mexico, the production of sugar cane in southern Mexico and a video of a kosher abattoir in Mexico. I also briefly held a position as a film critic for a local newspaper in Puebla. In 2007, I travelled to Melbourne, Australia, where I studied a Master of Arts in Cinema Management at the University of Melbourne. Through my experience as editor, I also worked at the National Gallery of Victoria - the largest gallery in Australia - as a multimedia designer. This experience led me to start a PhD in Art History at the University of Melbourne on the destruction of Indigenous rock art in Western Australia. I completed my PhD thanks to a generous scholarship offered by the Mexican National Council of Science and Technology and the University of Melbourne. After finishing my PhD, I worked as research assistant in two projects at the University of Melbourne, one on Digital Humanities and the other on the deaccession of artworks in museums. I also worked as a freelance translator and interpreter, as well as a curator of art and heritage exhibitions in Melbourne. In 2015, I was a Visiting Scholar at the University of Birmingham and later I undertook postdoctoral work at Deakin University, in Australia. In 2018 and 2019 I was a British Academy Visiting Fellow working with members of Forensic Architecture in a series of projects on heritage destruction. In 2020, I was awarded a fellowship as an Associate Scholar at the Italian Academy (Columbia University). After teaching at the University of Melbourne in 2022 and 2023, I joined Newcastle University in 2023.

Qualifications

PhD (Art History, Archaeology and Heritage Studies), University of Melbourne, 2009-14

MA (Cinema Management), University of Melbourne, 2007-8.

BA (Honours) Communication Sciences, University of the Americas-Puebla, 2000-05.

Google Scholar profile

Research Interests

My research is about the destruction of heritage and iconoclasm (the destruction of images for political and religious reasons).

I am interested in the intersection between art, heritage and media and how can we understand them in terms of questions of power, identity and aesthetics. I have published widely on heritage destruction and iconoclasm in Australia, Iraq, Syria, Myanmar, Mexico, videogames and Google. By analysing and interpreting heritage destruction, I firmly believe that we can uncover how heritage is really managed on the ground as opposed to what official discourses affirm. In doing so, I am interested in using heritage destruction as an analytical tool that can assist in the management of cultural heritage. I am also interested in the connection between contemporary art and heritage destruction whereby contemporary artists are using the discourse of heritage destruction to create contemporary works of art.

Research projects

• I was part of a research project funded by the Australian Department of Defence that measured the destruction of heritage in Iraq and Syria (2015-2018) at Deakin University, Australia.
• As a British Academy Visiting Fellow, I contributed to the exhibition "Maps of Defiance" (UK entry to the 2018 London Design Biennale) curated by the V&A and produced by Forensic Architecture (Goldsmiths University). The exhibition showed the extent of the destruction of Yezidi heritage perpetrated by the so-called Islamic State.
• Likewise, I was also part of the research team that investigated the destruction of the landscape in Vaca Muerta, Argentina, by gas companies, carried out by Forensic Architecture.

Esteem Indicators

• I am a co-editor of the first handbook of heritage destruction published by Routledge in 2023.

I am the module leader of:

MCH8612 Heritage Lives, Media, Messages and Form (Semester 1).

MCH8552 Heritage Processes, Global Perspectives, Practices and Politics (Semester 2).

• Articles

  • Gonzalez Zarandona, JA, Albarran Torres, C, Isakhan, B. Digitally Mediated Iconoclasm: the Islamic State and the war on cultural heritage. International Journal of Heritage Studies 2018, 24, 649-671. In Preparation.
  • Isakhan, B, Gonzalez Zarandona, JA. Layers of religious and political iconoclasm under the Islamic State: symbolic sectarianism and pre-monotheistic iconoclasm. International Journal of Heritage Studies 2017, 24, 1-16.

• Authored Book

  • Gonzalez Zarandona, A. Murujuga—Rock Art, Heritage and Landscape Iconoclasm. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2020.

• Book Chapters

  • Gonzalez A. Between heritage and the readymade—the imminent aesthetic of Ai Weiwei. In: Gonzalez, A; Cunliffe, E; Saldin, M, ed. The Routledge Handbook of Heritage Destruction. New York and London: Routledge, 2023, pp.174-184. In Preparation.
  • Gonzalez A, Cunliffe E, Saldin M. A path well worn? Approaches for the old problem of heritage destruction. In: Gonzalez, A; Cunliffe, E; Saldin, M, ed. The Routledge Handbook of Heritage Destruction. New York and London: Routledge, 2023, pp.1-33. In Preparation.
  • Rufian Fernandez F, Sabrine I, Gonzalez A. The role of civil society in the application of international law for heritage protection in countries in conflict in the MENA region. In: Niglio, O; Yong Joong Lee, E, ed. Transcultural Diplomacy and International Law in Heritage Conservation. A Dialogue between Ethics, Law, and Culture. Springer, 2021, pp.409-426. In Preparation.

• Edited Book

  • González Zarandona JA, Cunliffe E, Saldin M, ed. The Routledge Handbook of Heritage Destruction. Abingdon, Oxon; New York: Routledge, 2024.