The Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art galleries re-opened on January 18th with Left Front: Radical Art in the “Red Decade,” 1929–1940, and Steichen ǀ Warhol: Picturing Fame, with welcoming remarks by Northwestern University President Morton Schapiro.

Featured exhibitions take two distinct approaches to exploring class and society in America during the 20th century and are joined by WORK PRINT PROTEST REPEAT, an exhibition curated by undergraduate art history students exploring the change in protest imagery over time. Opening day program included:

CONVERSATION with W.J.T. Mitchell asks “What does art have to do with Revolution? A Long View” Mitchell is the editor of Critical Inquiry and Professor of English and Art History at the University of Chicago. Professor Mitchell will connect artistic concerns of the 1930s to present-day artistic practices, specifically the relations between art and activism.

DIALOGUE with curators John Murphy and Jill Bugajski, PhD candidates in the Department of Art History, Northwestern University, and Elliot Reichert, Curator of Special Projects, Block Museum hosted by W.J.T. Mitchell.

PERFORMANCES by Northwestern University students – in collaboration with Professor D. Soyini Madison, Chair, Department of Performance Studies, Northwestern University.

The Block’s winter exhibitions and programs are supported by the Terra Foundation for American Art, as well as the Terra Foundation on behalf of William Osborn and David Kabiller, the Myers Foundations and the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation. Additional funding comes from the Carlyle Anderson Endowment, the Alsdorf Gallery Endowment, the Norton S. Walbridge Fund, the Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities, the Louise E. Drangsholt Fund, the Kessel Fund at the Block Museum, and the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.