November 19, 2009

Phoebe Gloeckner

Through a Glass Darkly

Writer and visual artist Phoebe Gloeckner is the author of A Child's Life and Other Stories (1998) and The Diary of a Teenage Girl (2002), called "one of the most brutally honest, shocking, tender and beautiful portrayals of growing up female in America.” A Guggenheim Fellowship recipient, Gloeckner is currently working on a novel based on the lives of several families in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico. Gloeckner is an assistant professor at the University of Michigan.

 

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November 12, 2009

Robert & Shana ParkeHarrison

Intent

Photographers Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison continue to pursue, with absorbing psychological and sensory effect, the ever-bleakening relationship linking humans, technology, and nature. At once formally arresting and immeasurably loaded with sensations—the work has a powerful impact both visually and viscerally. With support from the UM Museum of Art (UMMA). The ParkeHarrison’s lecture is complemented by an exhibition of their work in the School of Art & Design’s Slusser Gallery October 16- November 13.

 

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November 5, 2009

Jamy Ian Swiss

Sleight of Hand: How Bodies Fool Minds

“Jamy Ian Swiss is like seeing Yo-Yo Ma practicing scales at Carnegie Hall.” Swiss explodes some of the commonplace myths about illusion-making, and provides a view of the real work of the magician. He examines the role of body language in deception, considers why psychology is more important than speed and discusses and demonstrates magic that is done with the human body itself, both as a property of performance, and as a tool of the secret workings of magic.  With support from UM Arts on Earth and the University Musical Society (UMS).

 

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October 29, 2009

Margaret Livingstone

What Art tells us about the Brain

Neurobiologist Margaret Livingstone explores why some Impressionist paintings shimmer, why some op art paintings seem to move, principles of Matisse's use of color, and how the Impressionists painted "air". She explores how artists have intuited important features about how our brains extract relevant information about faces and objects, and why learning disabilities may be associated with artistic talent.

With support from the UM Department of Psychology.

 

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October 22, 2009

Paula Scher

New York Design

Graphic designer Paula Scher has been a partner at Pentagram since 1991 where she has developed identity and branding systems, promotional materials, environmental graphics, and publication designs for clients world wide. She is a recipient of the Chrysler Award for Innovation and the AIGA medal. With support from AIGA Detroit - the professional association for design.

 

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October 8, 2009

Bernard Khoury

New Wars in Progress

Iconoclastic architect Bernard Khoury is currently working on projects in the Arabian Gulf region. His commissions include banks and apartment buildings in Beirut, shopping malls in Kuwait, a women’s spa in Saudi Arabia, a 30-story office tower in Dubai, and a new media center in Armenia that are each, in different ways, a reflection of the cultural and economic transformation underway throughout the region.  With support from the UM Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, and the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD).

 

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October 1, 2009

Douglas Hollis

Learning to Listen – Reflections of a Public Artist

Since the early 1970s, installation artist Doug Hollis has translated his interest in landscape and natural phenomenon into wind- and water-activated sound structures that have an oasis-like quality where people can pause to catch their spiritual breath in the midst of their everyday lives. With support from the UM Health Systems Gifts of Art and Chelsea River Gallery.

 

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September 24, 2009

Dave Gallo & Bill Lange

Deep Sea Discoveries

Pioneers in ocean exploration, Dave Gallo and Bill Lange work closely with scientists at the forefront of ocean research to bring to light underwater discoveries such as the world's highest mountains and deepest valleys; underwater rivers, waterfalls, lakes, and thriving communities of life in dark worlds. With support from the UM Program in the Environment and the Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic and Space Sciences.

 

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September 17, 2009

Richard Barnes

Excavations and Iterations: The Museum Unveiled

Photographer Richard Barnes discusses his ongoing project “Animal Logic” examining how our relationship to the natural world is reflected in natural history collections. Outcomes of the project include exhibitions at the UMMA and Cranbrook Institute of Science, and a book. 

In Conjunction with the UM LSA theme semester “Meaningful Objects:  Museums in the Academy,” and in partnership with Cranbrook, the UM Museum of Art, the Institute for the Humanities, and the Exhibit Museum of Natural History.

 

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September 10, 2009

Bob Mankoff

The Past, Present, and Future of Humor

From primate play to The New Yorker cartoons, The Daily show, and the latest Youtube mash-ups, Bob Mankoff, Cartoon Editor of the New Yorker magazine, demonstrates how all humor is an act of cooperative creativity. With support from the UM Institute for the Humanities, and the Department of Psychology.

 

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April 9, 2009

Clotaire Rapaille

The Logic of Emotion

Dr. G. Clotaire Rapaille is an internationally known expert in creativity and communication. His marketing strategies have grown out of his work in the areas of psychiatry, psychology, and cultural anthropology, combining a pyschiatrist’s depth of analysis with a business person’s attention to practical concerns. He has written more than ten books including, Creative Communication, recognized as the standard reference for the French advertising community. His most recent book, the best selling, The Culture Code, sheds light not just on business but on the way every human being acts and lives.

With support from the UM Yaffe Center for Persuasive Communication at the Ross School of Business, the UM Institute for the Humanities, the UM College of Engineering Center for Entrepreneurship, and UM Arts on Earth.

 

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April 2, 2009

Mary Ellen Strom & Ann Carlson

Body and Camera

Through the lens of the historic record and art history, Ann Carlson and Mary Ellen Strom employ tactics of spectacle and humor to provide critical re-evaluations of cultural and historical narratives. Displayed as immersive projections or installations, their work simultaneously fuses video art’s tendencies towards the visually spectacular and its legacy as a tool for social change. Carlson and Strom examine the moving body within a range of ”landscapes”: the physical western vista, the economic terrain of late-capitalist America, and the artistic tradition of constructing these literal and ideological images.

With support from the UM Department of the History of Art, the UM Department of Dance, and MOCAD - Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit.

 

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March 26, 2009

George Manupelli

An Unauthorized History

Filmmaker, painter, collagist, activist and contrarian George Manupelli is the founder of the Ann Arbor Film Festival. In 1963, while teaching at the UM School of Art & Design and collaborating with the ONCE Group, he established the Ann Arbor Film Festival as a counterpoint to the New York destination art world. Manupelli directed the festival for 20 years defining it with his aesthetic sense of festival as event and film as art. He made numerous films while in Ann Arbor including the “Dr. Chicago” trilogy. Over 400 exhibitions of his art works, films, music, and performance pieces have been held throughout Europe, North, Central and South America.

With support from the 47th Ann Arbor Film Festival.

 

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March 19, 2009

Marina Abramovic

Performing Body

Performance is the language that Abramovic, winner of the Golden Lion at the 47th Venice Biennale in 1997, favors for her artistic expression. In performance the body empties itself to serve as a go-between for energy in its passage from matter to spirit and space. Her experiences in Tibet, in Ladakh and among the Australian Aborigines and her studies of various rituals have allowed her to understand how to bring the body to a borderline state.

With support from the UM Institute for Research on Women and Gender, Chelsea's River Gallery, and MOCAD - Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit.

 

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March 12, 2009

Richard Saul Wurman

A Conversation With Richard Saul Wurman

Richard Saul Wurman is an architect, a cartographer, the creator of the Access Travel Guide Series, and the author and designer of more than eighty books, including Information Architects (1996), Follow the Yellow Brick Road (1991) and Information Anxiety (1989). He has also served as chairman and creative director of the TED conferences. For Wurman: "The only way to communicate is to understand what it is like not to understand. It is at that moment that you can make something understandable. In the end, all I am ever trying to do with every project I do is to do good work.”

With support form the UM Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, UM School of Information, and AIGA Detroit, the Professional Association for Design.

 

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March 5, 2009

Jacque Fresco

Global Sustainability

Jacque Fresco is a futurist, industrial designer, behavioral scientist, artist, inventor, author and a master of "out of the box thinking". Fresco offers a bold new way of looking at our world and its unworkable social systems. He envisions a global civilization in which science and technology are applied in tandem with human and environmental concerns to secure, protect, and encourage a more humane world for all people, where human rights, are no longer paper proclamations but a way of life.

With support from the UM Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning.

 

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February 12, 2009

Anne Pasternak

Public Art Then & Now: From the Strange to Spectacular and Back Again

Anne Pasternak is the President and Artistic Director of Creative Time, an organization that has been commissioning and presenting innovative art in New York City since 1972 Pasternak is committed to initiating projects that give artists opportunities to innovate, preserve public space as a place of creative expression, and respond to timely issues. Over the past decade, she has worked closely with such artists as Doug Aitken, Laurie Anderson, David Byrne, Jenny Holzer, Gary Hume, Vik Muniz, Takashi Murakami, Shirin Neshat, Steve Powers, Cai Guo Qiang, and many many more. Pasternak also curates independent exhibitions, consults on urban planning initiatives, and contributes essays to cultural publications

With support from the UM Institute for Research on Women and Gender, the Ann Arbor Public Art Commission, ArtServe Michigan, and Chelsea's River Gallery.

 

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February 5, 2009

José Francisco Salgado

Science Communication through Art and Technology

Astronomer and science visualizer José Francisco Salgado uses his skills in astronomy education and visual arts to create multimedia works that communicate science in engaging ways. Currently on staff at the Adler Planetarium & Astronomy Museum in Chicago, Salgado’s education and outreach efforts include Spanish-language programs, an Emmy-nominated astronomy news segment, and astronomy video suites created to accompany live performances of classical music concerts. In his presentation, Salgado discusses these programs and techniques and the ways Adler astronomers use the museum's Space Visualization Laboratory to communicate science.

With support from the UM Winter 2009 LSA Theme Semester, The Universe: Yours to Discover.

 

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January 29, 2009

Hannah Smotrich

Community Narratives

Graphic designer Hannah Smotrich's work centers on issues of community, cultural history, identity and voice. Her projects explore the stories of our individual lives and the collective narratives of our communities, the many ways in which we communicate—and the walls we construct that complicate connection. Recent work includes a participatory public art project at the Jewish Cultural Festival in Krakow, Poland, an integrated system of street signs and publications for Neighborhood Heritage Trails in Washington, DC, and an exhibit for Museum L-A on the lives and community of textile workers in Lewiston, Maine.

 

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January 22, 2009

Gilgamesh

(re)creating Gilgamesh: The Artistic and Technical Exploration of an Ancient Epic

Clarinetist and Composer Kinan Azmeh and Visual Artist Kevork Mourad have collaborated to illuminate the ancient Mesopotamian Epic of Gilgamesh, using both music and painting as vehicles for story telling. In this presentation, prior to their weekend UMS performances, the artists discuss the origins of the project and their creative collaboration. They also demonstrate the fusion of music, painting, and technology through performance excerpts and examination of the more technical aspects of their work.

 

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