The Middle East and North African Studies Program and Block Museum of Art joined together in May 2018 to present three days of series of screenings and discussions with one of Iran’s leading filmmakers, Bahman Ghobadi. The series, titled Life on the Border: The Cinema of Bahman Ghobadi, was made possible by Tamilla Ghodsi (WCAS ‘91) […]
Prior to Thomas Edison’s groundbreaking invention of sound recording and playback technology in 1877, the ephemerality of sound meant that it only existed in the moment of its creation. To “record” sound before this time meant it appeared as oral or written descriptions or musical scores. In 2008, Patrick Feaster, a researcher and educator […]
What does an image sound like? This is the question that Northwestern University students sought to answer in an experimental workshop earlier this month. Students in computer science, engineering, sound arts, and art theory and practice joined together for a day-long session with artist Dario Robleto and media historian Patrick Feaster to delve into the […]
Artist and writer Jen Bervin embraces subjects as wide-ranging as the Mississippi River, Emily Dickinson’s poetry, and the history of silk, weaving, and nanotechnology. On February 21, 2018 the artist, Jeanne Dunning, Art Theory & Practice professor, and Susy Bielak, Susan and Stephen Wilson Associate Director of Engagement/Curator of Public Practice, sat down for a conversation about Bervin’s work. In […]
UCLA Professor of English and Comparative Literature Saree Makdisi joined the block Museum to discuss the historical parallels between Blake’s era and the 1960’s, examining how these concurrent histories are the result of profound changes in politics, economy, art, and society during their respective periods. From the lecture: The [Block Museum] exhibition is one of […]
On November 17 & 18th, 2016 renowned international scholars and artists convened at the Block Museum to discuss the art of movie poster design, the art and industry of film, and the unique culture of cinephilia in Iran. This symposium, Lucid Figurations: Iranian Movie Poster & Film Art served as the capstone event of the […]
The Block Museum’s ongoing speaker series, The Visual Vanguard is presenting conversations with innovative arts leaders from across the globe. To kick off the series, the Block hosted a talk with Northwestern alumnus Thom Collins, Executive Director and President of the Barnes Foundation, on Wednesday, November 2. Collins’ presentation included a detailed outline of the Barnes’ past, […]
Artist Hasan Elahi’s Tracking Transience project examines the relationship between location, repetition, technology, and surveillance in today’s media age In Aspen, Colorado in 1978, a group of MIT researchers affixed a stop-frame camera atop a car and drove it throughout the popular ski resort town. Combining the footage with a computer, laserdisc player, and touchscreen […]
A roundtable discussion of Annual New York Avant Garde Festivals, moderated by Hannah Higgins, professor of art history at University of Illinois at Chicago, and featuring Carolee Schneemann, multidisciplinary artist who transformed the discourse of the body, sexuality, and gender; Alison Knowles, multi-media Fluxus artist; Jim McWilliams, designer of most of the posters for the […]
“Food is social.” Last Saturday, this idea rang true at the Block Museum’s Opening Day Program for The Last Supper: 600 Plates Illustrating Final Meals of U.S. Death Row Inmates, an installation by Julie Green. In this exhibition, food highlights the human dimension of one of our nation’s most polarizing issues: capital punishment. Green, Professor […]