The Block is delighted to welcome Emmanuel Ramos-Barajas as the museum’s 2026–2027 interdisciplinary graduate fellow. Emmanuel is a doctoral candidate in Screen Cultures at Northwestern University whose research examines how cultural production across Mexico and the United States has shaped understandings of national identity, placemaking, and history. At The Block, he brings this perspective to […]
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“Wildcats in Water” is a monthly seminar series hosted by NU Water at Northwestern University, showcasing student and faculty research on water technology and policy. It serves as a hub for collaborative research on water security, quality, and sustainability On April 8, the Wildcats in Water student seminar series, which typically hears from scientists and researchers, looked at […]
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The Block is delighted to welcome Eduardo Ramírez Bello as the museum’s 2025–2026 graduate interdisciplinary fellow. Eduardo is a PhD candidate in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Northwestern University. He holds a B.A. in Hispanic Literature from the University of Guadalajara and an M.A. in Peninsular and Spanish American Literature from the University […]
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The Block Museum has recently received a significant bequest from the estate of Thomas J. Hamilton (1931–2022) (MBA ’79), a Washington, DC, theater artist, playwright, and director of the Source Theatre who was also a dedicated collector of modern and contemporary works on paper. Hamilton grew up in the Midwest and maintained connections to Chicago […]
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In August 2025, Block Cinema’s groundbreaking Trans Portraiture series traveled beyond Evanston to Philadelphia, where Michael Metzger, Pick-Laudati Academic Curator for Cinema and Media Arts, presented highlights of the program at the 31st annual Visible Evidence Conference. Visible Evidence, the premier international gathering of scholars and practitioners of documentary and nonfiction media, convened this year […]
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Project highlights Block Cinema’s growing role as a center for media research and discovery at Northwestern University. The Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University has received a Basic Preservation Grant from the National Film Preservation Foundation (NFPF) to support the restoration and preservation of four rare films by independent Kentucky animator Ed Counts (1946–2009). […]
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Stephanie S. E. Lee and Kathleen Bickford Berzock reflect on international exchange and the power of print In May 2025, two Block Museum team members, Stephanie S. E. Lee and Kathleen Bickford Berzock, traveled to Seoul, South Korea, to participate in Afro-Eurasian Histories of Print, a traveling seminar organized by the Clark Art Institute’s Research […]
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What stories shape Chicago’s Native art scene? Who holds them, and where do we look to learn more? The Block is proud to share Art for Zhegagoynak: A Resource Guide to a Local History by Jacqueline Lopez, 2024-2025 Interdisciplinary Graduate Fellow— chronicling seventy years of Indigenous-led artmaking, mentorship, and community building in the region now […]
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This spring, Corinne Granof, Block Museum Academic Curator and Stephanie S. E. Lee, 2024-25 Art History Graduate Fellow, spent a day at the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation in New York, gathering research for the exhibition Pouring, Spilling, Bleeding: Helen Frankenthaler and Artists’ Experiments on Paper, opening at The Block in fall 2025. The visit offered insight […]
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On a recent Monday afternoon, The Block Cinema team and a handful of scholars from across Northwestern gathered in the empty auditorium to screen the film Paydirt (1981), a little-seen film by director Penny Allen about Oregon winemakers who grow marijuana to ease financial strain. The event was part of a series of weekly research […]
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