The lecture series would like to thank the Dean of Arts Development Fund at 麻豆AV, Media@麻豆AV,听and a generous anonymous donor for contributing to the series.
Unless otherwise noted, the events will take place at the Department of Art History and Communication Studies, Arts building, room W-215 at 4:00pm.
To subscribe to the AHCS Events mailing list, please contact: caitlin.loney [at] mcgill.ca
Fall 2018
Sept 21
Arctic Ink
(University of听Rochester)
Arts W-20, 4-6pm
Co-sponsored with听 research group
础产蝉迟谤补肠迟:听When a mysterious cache of sixteenth-century Netherlandish engravings was found in the Arctic circle in 1870, many questions arose. What do such objects, for example, tell us about narratives of Renaissance globalization? About "cultural exchange" conceptualized not in terms of movement and difference, but of stasis, mundanity, and sameness?
叠颈辞:听Christopher Heuer holds a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley in the history of art and architecture (2003) and completed a predoctoral fellowship at the Kunsthistorisch Instituut of the Rijksuniversiteit Leiden (2000鈥�2002). He earned his MA from the University of Southern California in the history of art and architecture (1997) and graduated from Bowdoin College in 1994 with a bachelor鈥檚 degree cum laude, double majoring in art history and philosophy. He was an assistant professor in the Department of Art and Archaeology at Princeton University from 2007鈥�2014 and was recently the Samuel H. Kress Senior Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. He is a widely recognized specialist in early modern European art and architecture, with an emphasis on painting, architecture, and print culture in northern Europe. He is the author of The City Rehearsed: Object, Architecture, and Print in the Worlds of Hans Vredeman de Vries. Currently, Heuer is working on books examining Albrecht D眉rer and kinesis, and Renaissance encounters with the Arctic.
October 11-12
Co-sponsored with IGSF and Centre for Research on Gender,听 Health, and Medicine
To mark the 30th anniversary of the decriminalization of abortion in Canada, this bilingual two-day conference organized by the 麻豆AV Institute for Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Studies (IGSF) and the Centre for Research on Gender, Health, and Medicine will focus on the "self-management" in order to assess contemporary questions, research, and activism around abortion both locally and globally.
October 14
Networking Global Communication in and Beyond the Age of Social Media
Conference co-sponsored听with Media@麻豆AV
In his 2016 book听Marconi, 麻豆AV Professor Emeritus Marc Raboy made the case for attending to the relationship between mediated communication and social transformations since the mid-nineteenth century, seeing the evolution of our communication system as a layered process of continuity and change. This conference responds to Raboy鈥檚 call for more historically informed analyses of global and networked communication. It foregrounds the interrelated roles of media governance, institutions, and movements for social change. Featuring contributions from Darin Barney (麻豆AV), Greg Taylor (University of Calgary), Arne Hintz (Cardiff University), Claudia Padovani (University of Padova), Jeremy Shtern (Ryerson University), and Erol Salamon (University of Minnesota) among others, this conference will present panels on four topics: 鈥淭hinking about Globally Networked Communication,鈥� 鈥淢edia Governance and Policy,鈥� 鈥淚nstitutions of Public Media,鈥� and 鈥淪ocial Movements and Media Messages: Qu茅bec and Beyond.鈥� Papers presented at this conference will be published as The Handbook of Global Media Policy Research in the International Association for Media and Communication Research鈥檚 series with Palgrave.
翱肠迟听17听
Just Watching: Cold War Science and the Ethics of Observation
听(University of Pennsylvania)
Arts 260,听4-6pm
Keynote presentation of the
Co-sponsorship with LLC/IGSF
Abstract: This essay considers ethological research on communication in the human and natural sciences after WWII, looking at the two-way traffic between 鈥渁nimal sociology鈥� and naturalistic accounts of group interaction among humans. Ranging from discussions of the signaling behavior of homosexual geese at the Macy Conferences on 鈥淕roup Processes鈥� to Laud Humphreys鈥� in situ research on sex in public restrooms in the 1960s, this paper argues that observational research offered an alternative to psychological accounts of both human and animal motivation, and in many cases resulted in less stigmatizing and non-essentialist accounts of non-normative behavior. While it may seem especially perverse to champion observation during the Cold War, I argue that the emphasis on militarized surveillance has obscured the diverse and contradictory uses of observation in this period. This essay is taken from my book project,听Underdogs, which traces the roots of queer studies in post-WWII social science.
叠颈辞:听Heather Love听received her A.B. from Harvard and her Ph.D. from the University of Virginia. Her research interests include gender and sexuality studies, twentieth-century literature and culture, affect studies, sociology and literature, disability studies, film and visual culture, and critical theory. She is the author of听Feeling Backward: Loss and the Politics of Queer History听(Harvard) and the editor of a special issue of听GLQ听on Gayle Rubin (鈥淩ethinking Sex鈥�) and the co-editor of a special issue of Representations ("Description Across Disciplines"). She has written on topics including comparative social stigma, compulsory happiness, transgender fiction, spinster aesthetics, reading methods in literary studies, and the history of deviance studies. She is currently completing a book on practices of description in the humanities and social sciences after World War II.
Oct听19
Fragile Colors: The Art of Glassmaking and the Imitation of Nature
Sven Dupr茅 (University of Amsterdam)
AHCS Research Forum, in co-sponsorship with Le S茅minaire des nouveaux modernes
4:00-6:00 PM; Arts W-220
Bio: Sven Dupr茅 is Professor of History of Art, Science and Technology at the University of Amsterdam (Conservation & Restoration)andChair of History of Art, Science and Technology at Utrecht University (History & Art History). Dupr茅鈥檚 research sits at the crossroads of technical art history and the history of science and technology. He is theDirector of the project 鈥楾echnique in the Arts: Concepts, Practices, Expertise, 1500-1950鈥� (ARTECHNE), supported by a European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator Grant, in cooperationwith conservatorsat the Atelier Buildingin Amsterdam, where the Rijksmuseum, the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands and the University of Amsterdam combine their knowledge in the field of restoration of art objects.Since 2018 he also heads the NWO Smart Culture digital art history project on the history of glass focusing on the archives of the artist Sybren Valkema (1916-1996), in collaboration with the FoundationVrij Glas, the RKD Netherlands Institute for Art History, the Corning Museum of Glass and the Glasmuseum Hentrich, Dusseldorf.He is a member of the editorial boards of the journals听Nuncius,听Science in Contextand听Studium, an associate editor of听History of Humanities, a former member of the advisory board of听Isis, co-editor of theNuncius听book series on material and visual history of science (Brill Publishers), and an advisory board member of the book series听Studies in Art &Materiality听(Brill Publishers).
Oct听25
Arctic Journalisms, Civic Spaces, and Indigenous Publics
Candis Callison (UBC Graduate School of Journalism/Princeton University)
Arts W-215, 4-6 pm
Co-sponsorship with Media@麻豆AV
Abstract :Mobilizing Indigenous experiences with and narratives about climate change through various media provides important insight for broad global publics about what it means to live with climate change both in the observable present and the predicted future. Representing and reporting on diverse Indigenous peoples however can be extremely challenging given that mainstream media narratives have often tended to reproduce stereotypes, ignore Indigenous knowledges, erase the ongoing impacts of colonialism, and/or frame Indigenous people as proxies, victims, or heroes. Drawing on research related to media in and about the Canadian Arctic, this talk examines how and where journalism might contribute to communal resilience, historical understandings of adaptation and climatic shifts, and reflect robust civic spaces and imaginations among global and regional audiences that include Indigenous publics.
Bio: Candis Callison is an Associate Professor in the Graduate School of Journalism at UBC. Her research and teaching are focused on changes to media practices and platforms, journalism ethics, the role of social movements in public discourse, and understanding how issues related to science and technology become meaningful for diverse publics. Callison鈥檚 book, How Climate Change Comes to Matter: The Communal Life of Facts (Duke University Press, 2014) uses ethnographic methods and a comparative lens to bring together the work of science journalists, scientists, and three distinct social groups that are outside environmental movement and policy frameworks in an American context. Callison leads a research team on arctic journalism, funded through a SSHRC Insight Grant. They are researching changes to professional norms, practices and standards for Canadian Arctic journalists working in an era of environmental change and global audiences. Since the project launched in 2014, research assistants have jointly conducted ethnographic research, completed a portion of their required Master of Journalism summer internships in the three northern Canadian territories, and provided live reporting and media analysis during the COP 21 meetings in Paris.
Oct 30
Responsible journalism in the age of hyper-polarization
Phil Gohier, Mark Lloyd, and Jennifer Ditchburn
Moderator: Andrew Potter
Faculty Club听3450 rue McTavish, 5:3-7:30 pm
Presented by Max Bell School of Public Policy and Media@麻豆AV
For many observers, the American media鈥檚 commitment to 鈥渂alance鈥� contributed to President Trump鈥檚 victory by normalizing his views and behaviour and fueling the public鈥檚 belief that 鈥渂oth sides are corrupt鈥�. This problem is only amplified when it comes to reporting on far-right nationalist groups, where the mere act of covering them can arguably provide them with undeserved legitimacy.
In response, people like NYU professor Jay Rosen have asserted that this is no time for balanced journalism; instead the media simply need to 鈥渄eclare their biases鈥� as transparently as possible. But what does this mean in practice? For example, how should the media report on Quebec鈥檚 far-right group Atalante, whose members recently raided the office of Vice Magazine and threatened a reporter whose coverage they did not like? Or how can the media do its job in an environment where left-leaning social media mobs appoint themselves as overseers of editorial standards and decision-making, and are quick to condemn a publication for giving a voice or platform to figures who they consider beyond the pale of legitimate debate? And what are the implications from all this for public policy?
Join the Max Bell School of Public Policy and听Media@麻豆AV听in welcoming Phil Gohier, Mark Lloyd, and Jennifer Ditchburn for a conversation moderated by Andrew Potter, which explores the demands and responses of responsible journalism in dealing with these challenges.
Nov听15
Dangerous Exposures: Work and Waste in Victorian Photography and the Chemical Trades
(Wesleyan University)
Arts W-215, 4-6pm
Bio: Jennifer Tucker is Associate Professor of History at Wesleyan University where she is also a member of the faculty of the Science in Society Program and the College of the Environment, and currently serves as Interim Chair of the Feminist, Gender and Sexuality Studies Program. She received her BA in Human Biology (Neuropsychology of Vision, Perception, and Memory) from Stanford University, MPhil in the Dept. of the History and Philosophy of Science from the University of Cambridge (Marshall Scholarship, Gonville and Caius College), and Ph.D. in the History of Science, Medicine, and Technology from Johns Hopkins University. A historian of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century British society, she specializes in the history of technology, science, art, visual and material culture. Tucker currently is working on two new book-length projects. One, titled ,鈥� traces the historical roots of the use of visual evidence in environmental science and pollution reform, and explores the visual representation in chemical climatology and the presentation of visual exhibits in Victorian courtroom debates over air and river pollution. The other, titled 鈥淐aught on Camera,鈥� is a book-length study about the legal and cultural history of photographic detection and evasion, and is funded by a . She began work on both of these projects as a Visiting Fellow at the , Canberra in 2015 and as a Senior Scholar at Birkbeck, University of London, in 2016.
Nov 19
听(Vanderbilt University)
Rathlyn Lecture in Disability Studies听
Redpath Library Building, Research Commons A,听4 鈥� 6 pm
听is assistant professor of Medicine, Health, & Society and American Studies at Vanderbilt University, and director of the Critical Design Lab and听听project. Their interdisciplinary research spans critical disability theory, feminist and crip technoscience, new materialisms, and design. Hamraie is the author of听听(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2017). Their articles on disability and design appear in听American Quarterly,Disability Studies Quarterly, Foucault Studies, Design and Culture, Hypatia, philoSOPHIA,听and听Age Culture Humanities,听as well as听Disability Space Architecture听(Routledge, 2017) and听The Politics of Place and Space(Cambridge University Press, 2012). Hamraie鈥檚 research has been funded by the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Arts, the Social Science Research Council, the National Humanities Alliance, and the Smithsonian鈥檚 Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation.
Admission is free, but RSVP is required through听
For additional information or to identify your accessibility needs, please contact:disabilities.students [at] mcgill.ca
Dec 6
Other Ways of Seeing
Sharon Sliwinski (Faculty of Information and Media Studies, Centre for the Study of Theory and Criticism, University of Western Ontario)
Arts W-215, 4-6pm
In his late work, John Berger both returned to and expanded upon his signal ideas about the language of images, experimenting with what we might call 鈥渙ther ways of seeing.鈥� Sometimes these experiments were political in nature鈥攁ttempts to register how political crises can flatten the visual field, eroding our appetite for that dimension of the imaginary order that does not yield directly to sight. And sometimes the experiments were more intimate鈥攇estures that sought to re-enliven gendered encounters, for instance. My presentation will explore some of these other ways of seeing, with particular attention to the picturing of migrants and refugees. The aim of the discussion will be to explore the relationship between visual praxis, forms of regard, and the structure of the political imaginary.
Winter 2019
Jan 10
A Good Woman With a Gun: U.S. Mythologies of Race, Gender, and Self-Defense
Caroline Light (Director of Undergraduate Studies and Senior Lecturer, Studies of Women, Gender and Sexuality, Harvard University)
Arts W-215, 4-6pm
Abstract: What accounts for the rhetorical power of the recurring trope of the self-possessed, heroic, and implicitly听white听鈥済ood woman with a gun,鈥� and against whom is she presumed to defend herself? This talk will explore some of the early iconography by which the armed white woman became a symbol of virtuous and vulnerable nationhood while addressing the intersecting racial and gender logics that contributed to a national ideal of what historian Barbara Cutter calls 鈥渋nnocent violence鈥� in the name of collective self-defense.
Bio:听Caroline Light is the Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Program in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Harvard. She has a doctorate in history, and her work explores the ways in which race, gender, and region shape collective (mis)memory and archival silence. Her first book,听听(NYU Press, 2014) discusses how gendered and racialized performances of elite, white cultural capital served as a critical mode of survival for a racially liminal community of southerners. Her recent book,听听(Beacon Press, 2017) tracks the history of lethal self-defense in the U.S., from the duty to retreat to the 鈥渟hoot first, ask questions later鈥� ethos that prevails in many jurisdictions today.
Public Lecture:听Thursday, January 10th, 2019: 4:00pm, Arts W-215
Seminar (registration required): Friday, January 11th,听2019: 9:00 am to 11:00am, Arts W-220
Sponsors:
Prof. Jason Opal, Chair History and Classical Studies 麻豆AV
Prof. Charmaine A. Nelson, Art History and Communication Studies, 麻豆AV
Prof. Alanna Thain, Director, IGSF, 麻豆AV
Feb 21
In the Belly of the Whale: Reflections on Precarious Future(s) and Aging Settler/ Colonial Institutions
Andrew Hunter (Independent artist, curator, educator and writer)
Arts W-215, 4-6pm
Abstract:听Through a combination of personal stories, historical narratives, contemporary art, museum case studies, and his own artist/curator projects, Andrew Hunter will consider the problematic pasts and precarious futures of museums, galleries and arts organizations, with an emphasis on Canadian institutions and their relationships with dominant global models. Emphasizing the colonial roots of these spaces, Hunter will reflect on the growing demands from many communities for significant, foundational change in these so-called 鈥減ublic鈥� institutions. Through the lenses of parallel disciplines (particularly natural history, life sciences and geology), Hunter considers the challenge, and potential barriers to, adaptation and confronting the underlying commitment of most institutions to retain their foundational cultures and structures.听In the Belly of the Whaleoffers a deeply personal and self-critical perspective, shaped by a wide range of experiences in the arts, from high profile positions, to the periphery and self-imposed exile.
鈥淗e lived with us in the belly of the whale, and the whale spit him out on the farther shore.鈥� - from听Opening Invocation听by Jean-Paul de Dadelsen (1950)
Bio: Andrew Hunter听is an artist, curator, educator and writer. Born and currently based in Hamilton, Ontario, he is a graduate of the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. Over three decades, he has worked nationally and internationally, holding curatorial positions across Canada (including at the Art Gallery of Hamilton, Vancouver Art Gallery and Art Gallery of Ontario) and, as both an artist and curator, has produced exhibitions and publications for such institutions as the National Gallery of Canada, Winnipeg Art Gallery, the Banff Centre for the Arts, Concordia University, University of Toronto, Museum of Modern Art Dubrovnik (Croatia), Hammer Museum at UCLA and Museum of Fine Arts Boston, among many others. Hunter ran the experimental interdisciplinary arts-based program听RENDER听(University of Waterloo), co-founded the creative research project听DodoLab听(with Lisa Hirmer) and has been a collaborator with the community focused arts research initiative听proboscis UK听(London, England). He has taught graduate and undergraduate courses at University of Waterloo/Waterloo Architecture and OCAD University and worked closely with organizations supporting at-risk and marginalized youth. A former house painter, steeplejack, caretaker and marina and factory labourer, Hunter鈥檚 grandparents came to Hamilton in the 1920s from Birmingham, England, and Glasgow, Scotland, as working people and his parents were Hamilton born and worked in industry and health care.
Hunter regularly writes and speaks about institutions of culture and history, the erasure of histories, the marginalization of cultures by colonial institutions and the responsibilities and accountabilities of settler communities. Since resigning his senior position as Curator of Canadian Art at the Art Gallery of Ontario in 2017, he has continued to be an outspoken critic of the entrenched systems of exclusion (defined by wealth, privilege and whiteness) that remain the foundations of so-called 鈥減ublic鈥� institutions. Recent talks include presentations at Harvard University, University of Glasgow, University of Toronto, and keynote talks at the 2018 Archives Association of Ontario Conference (Laurier University) and the 2018 Saskatchewan Artists Association Conference (University of Saskatchewan). Widely published, his most recent text, written as his alter-ego Professor William Starling, appears in the fall 2018 issue of听Blackflash听magazine.
At heart, Hunter鈥檚 work is multi-disciplinary and exploratory, incorporating visual art, writing, performance and media, as well as academic and archival research and story-telling. Acknowledging his status as a settler and invasive species, he is committed to collaboratively developing and sharing new approaches that break from colonial models and embracing the听Calls to Action听of the听Truth and Reconciliation Commission. In addition, the mental health of individuals, communities and cultures is (for personal and professional reasons) of fundamental importance to his life and work. Hunter considers it essential that work in the arts be socially and critically engaged and accepts the categorization of much of his work as 鈥渟ocial work鈥� (a term usually applied as a criticism).
March 21
Landscapes of Ignorance: Colonial Imaginaries in Danish and Norwegian Art and Visual Culture
Mathias Danbolt (University of Copenhagen)
Arts W-215, 4-6pm
Bio:听Mathias Danbolt is a Danish-Norwegian art historian who has a special focus on queer, feminist, and decolonial perspectives on art and visual culture. Danbolt is currently leading the collective research project 鈥淭he Art of Nordic Colonialism: Writing Transcultural Art Histories鈥� (2019-2021), supported by Carlsberg Foundation, which examines the effects and affects of Nordic colonialism within the field of art. He is the curator of the visual culture exhibition (2017-18), co-curated with Mette Kia Krabbe Meyer and Sarah Giersing at the Royal Danish Library, and has contributed to numerous journals and books, including collections such as Otherwise: Imagining Queer Feminist Art Histories (Manchester UP, 2016), Racialization, Racism, and Anti-Racism in the Nordic Countries (Palgrave, 2018), and Curatorial Challenges (Routledge, 2019). Danbolt is an Associate Professor of Art History at University of Copenhagen, Denmark, and member of , under The Royal Danish Academy of Science and Letters.
More information coming soon.
March 28
Medium-Specific Trompe l'Oeil: Notes Toward a General Theory
Noam M. Elcott (Columbia University)
Arts W-215, 4-6pm
Abstract: Whether the object of praise鈥攁s was the case at least since Pliny recounted the famous tale of Zeuxis, Parrhasius, the grapes that fooled the birds, and the curtain the fooled Zeuxis鈥攐r scorn, since at least the 18th century, when the term was coined, trompe l鈥檕eil implied the near-complete suppression of the chosen material and medium (generally painting) in favor the illusory real presence of the depicted objects. I would like to chart a parallel history of trompe l鈥檕eil, one in which the material substrate is constitutive of the illusion. Whereas the received wisdom asserts trompe l鈥檕eil as the paradigmatic instance of medium-self-effacement, I chart a counter history of trompe l鈥檕eil as a complex operation of medium-self-advertisement; in short: a media genealogy of medium-specific trompe l鈥檕eil.
Bio: Noam M. Elcott is Associate Professor of Art History and Archaeology at Columbia University, Chair of Art Humanities, an editor of the journal Grey Room, co-director of the Center for Comparative Media at Columbia University, and co-director of The August Sander Project (MoMA/Columbia). He is the author of Artificial Darkness: An Obscure History of Modern Art and Media (University of Chicago Press, 2016), winner of the 2017 Society for Cinema and Media Studies (SCMS) Anne Friedberg Innovative Scholarship Award, as well as essays on art, film, and media, published in leading journals, anthologies, and exhibition catalogues. His current book project is Art in the First Screen Age: L谩szl贸 Moholy-Nagy and the Cinefication of the Arts (University of Chicago Press).
March 29
Undergraduate Career Panel
Thompson House Ballroom
11:00-14:00
The AHCS career panel invites current undergraduate and graduate students in the AHCS Department, along with 麻豆AV postdocs, faculty, and recent alumni to participate in an informal roundtable moderated by AHCSSA and AHCSGSA members. Light refreshments will be served. Schedule available here.
April 1
Making Art in the Light and Shadow of Historical Trauma
Tamar Garb (Durning Lawrence Professor of History of art and Director of the Institute of Advanced Studies, University College London)
Arts W-215, 4-6pm
Abstract: My paper explores the role of selected artworks in addressing the historical trauma of 鈥榬ace鈥�. Focussing on three works by South African artists Santu Mofokeng, Zaneli Muholi and Berni Searle, I explore the ways in which their art complicates identitarian politics by staging 鈥榮elves鈥� that are formally and psychically inflected by posited 鈥榦thers鈥�. By placing themselves in a relationship of 鈥榮ympathy鈥� with strangers, these artists dislodge the sage boundaries and secure separations that legislated difference entails. They offer neither therapeutic redress nor reparation for past injury but instead provide a poetic space for working through and questioning ongoing separation and suffering.
Bio:听Tamar Garb is Durning Lawrence Professor in the History of Art and Director of the Institute of Advanced Studies at University College London. Her research interests have focused on questions of gender and sexuality, the woman artist and the body in nineteenth and early twentieth century French art and she has published extensively in this field. Key books in this area include Sisters of the Brush (1994), Bodies of Modernity (1998) and The Painted Face鈥�(2007). Her interests have turned recently to post-apartheid culture and art in South Africa as well as the history of photographic and lens-based practices in Africa and she has curated a number of international exhibitions including Figures and Fictions: Contemporary South African Photography (Victoria & Albert Museum, London 2011), Distance and Desire: Encounters with the African Archive (Walther Collection: New York, Ulm and Berlin. 2014-2015) and William Kentridge and Vivienne Koorland: A Conversation in Letters and Lines, (Fruitmarket Gallery Edinburgh, 2016). She is an art critic who has written on many contemporary artists including Mona Hatoum, Nancy Spero, Marlene Dumas, Zanele Muholi, Sabelo Mlangeni and Santu Mofokeng.