This year’s symposium explores the genealogy theme in art history and its broader implications. It delves into inheritance, omission, severance, recovery, adoption, and haunting within artistic lineages. The symposium offers a platform for interdisciplinary dialogue on how art movements and identities evolve and intersect over time. By interrogating genealogies through diverse theoretical lenses, “Descent/Dissent” aims to enrich our understanding of cultural heritage and contemporary identity formation. In this way, this symposium aligns with scholarly efforts to reinterpret art history beyond linear narratives, emphasizing the complex web of influences that shape artistic expression and cultural memory. Scholars from a wide variety of academic fields will have the opportunity to present their research, collaborate with others, and engage in fruitful interdisciplinary discourse. Additionally, in the interest of sharing the insights of the symposium with the wider academic community, the presented papers will be published in the Wollesen Art Journal.