As part of the Block Museum’s Student Acquisition initiative, Northwestern students in the 2020-2021 Block Museum Student Associates program selected artist Leonard Suryajaya’s Quarantine Blues (2020) for the museum’s collection. Suryajaya’s work explores complex intersections of intimacy, community and family, and how the “everyday is layered with histories, meanings, and potential.” In October 2021, Suryajaya joined the […]
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Throughout 2020-21 The Block Museum is reflecting on artworks from the collection that explore ideas of excess, consumption, and the environment, and offer an interdisciplinary perspective on the climate crisis. Our project is inspired by The Story of More by Hope Jahren, Northwestern University’s 2021-2022 One Book One Northwestern (OBON) selection. This online talk by […]
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During its September 2021 meeting, The Block Museum of Art Board of Advisors celebrated the extraordinary service and leadership of Christine O. Robb (WCAS ’66) (SP WCAS ’66) (Parent ’93) and welcomed new co-chairs Cheryl Johnson-Odim (WCAS MA ’75, WCAS PhD ’78) and Stuart H. Bohart (WCAS ’89, Parent ’25). Robb has served as the chair […]
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In November 2021, Block Cinema screened Property (1978) by filmmaker Penny Allen. In Property, Penny Allen turns her lens to the eccentric residents of a bohemian neighborhood in Portland, Oregon. The film, a critically under-seen gem of 1970s independent filmmaking, delivers an economic critique of urban renewal to warm, satirical effect. Property revels in the joy and […]
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In September 2021 the Block Museum welcomed Sarah Dwider as a 2021-2022 graduate fellow. Block Museum Graduate Fellowships are offered to two graduate students annually, one from Art History and one from any department within the Graduate School. Fellows are integral members of the museum staff supporting projects through exhibition and collection research, curating, writing, […]
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In The Story of More, the 2021–22 One Book One Northwestern selection, author Hope Jahren implores us to join the fight against climate change and illuminates some of the factors that led us to a crisis point. Jahren details how innovations in agriculture, farming, transportation, and the energy sector have led to greater efficiencies, but […]
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The Block Museum is excited to announce the 2021-2022 cohort of Block Museum Student Associates. This annual program renames and reimagines the museum’s former Student Docent program to better reflect the key role that this group of Northwestern scholars plays in animating the vision of the museum. Block Student Associates serve as tour guides, public […]
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Who gets in? Who decides? In recent years, questions about accessibility, representation, and inclusion have become central to an ongoing reexamination of the collecting practices and power structures of museums and the art world. Artists, curators, writers, and activists have emphasized the narrow framework of Western art history—a discipline dominated by white Euro-American institutions and […]
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Who Says, Who Shows, What Counts: Thinking about History with The Block’s Collection considers our constantly changing understanding of the past through the lens of artistic practice. On September 29, 2021 the Block Museum hosed a keynote conversation with exhibition artists Andrea Carlson, Tonika Lewis Johnson, and Chris Pappan who discussed how artists, artworks, and museums shape and challenge […]
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More than 80 new acquisitions on view invite audiences to consider how artists and collections challenge our view of the past How do artists, artworks, and museums shape and challenge our understanding of the past? The Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University celebrates its 40th anniversary and the full reopening of its galleries with the […]
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