The Art and Conflict Special Issue edited by members of Hunar Symposia arises from an approach to art and art-making as sites of witnessing, and as scenes for the making of communities to bear witness. Art made in relation to conflict makes a claim upon its witnesses and audiences: ‘this happened’, ‘this is the effect’, ‘this is what it was like’, or ‘this is what could be’. These mixed tenses of witnessing link together what Grabska and Horst (2022), in a special section on art for Conflict and Society, characterise as the capacity of art to generate alternative ‘ways of knowing’ with the potential for art to create or disrupt visions of the future. It is this potential which led to the existence of Hunar Symposia, and its inaugural activities in 2022.