2017-18 Newsletter.Indd

201718 NEWSLETTER Dear Friends and Colleagues: Next year, Krista Thompson will hold the Smithsonian George Gurney Senior It is my pleasure to highlight some of Fellowship at the Smithsonian American the past year’s accomplishments in Art Museum and, in November, Huey the Department of Art History and to Copeland will be Visiting Professor at reflect upon what has turned out to be the École des Hautes Études en Sciences a seven-year run as chair. Among many Sociales in Paris. faculty honors, fi rst mention goes to David Van Zanten who, after 38 years Three students completed the Ph.D. at Northwestern, retired at the end of this past year and the department Spring Quarter and is now Mary Jane graduated 10 students with the B.A. Crowe Professor of Art History Emeritus. Current graduate students continue to David has helped shape the study of garner prestigious awards including transatlantic architecture and urbanism fellowships from the Northwestern Paris in the modern era and the model of his Program in Critical Theory, the American scholarship served as the inspiration Association for University Women, for a symposium held this past May and the Fulbright Fellowship Program. which was co-sponsored by the Graham One of the singular successes of the Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Andrew W. Mellon Chicago Objects Fine Arts. As a small token of all David Study Initiative (COSI)—which received has done, the department will rename renewed funding this spring with a its annual, undergraduate prize for a $1.8 million grant from the Andrew paper written in a 300-level course as W. Mellon Foundation—has been the “David Van Zanten Prize in Advanced placement of that program’s fellows and Art Historical Writing.” interns in museum positions: this fall, Antawan Byrd will begin as Assistant Christina Kiaer had a banner year of Curator of Photography at the Art speaking engagements associated with Institute of Chicago the 100th anniversary of the Russian continued on page 11 Revolution, and also co-curated a related exhibition. At the Block Museum, Stephen Eisenman’s exhibition on FACULTY NEWS 2 William Blake and the Age of Aquarius STAFF NEWS 10 received critical praise as did the EVENTS 12 accompanying catalog published with PROGRAMMING 15 support from the department’s Warnock GRADUATE STUDENT NEWS 17 Publication Fund. Ann Gunter wrapped UNDERGRADUATE NEWS 22 up an enormous publication venture ALUMNI NEWS 24 that will benefi t the study of the art of UPCOMING EVENTS 28 the Ancient Near East immeasurably. of Contents Table Faculty News S. Hollis Clayson Hollis Clayson had an Eiffel lectured in French (for once!) in Paris Tower-centered year on leave. on (you guessed it) the Eiffel Tower; She spent November and December in April, she led a seminar on Mary as a Paul Mellon Fellow at CASVA Cassatt (at the INHA); and in June (Washington, D.C.), and April and lectured at the Philbrook (Tulsa) on May as a chercheuse invitée at the INHA Impressionist printmaking. The two (Paris) researching her new project, biggest events of the academic year: “The Inescapability of the Eiffel the birth of Maxwell Dean Cogbill Tower.” In November, she keynoted (October 27, 2017), and the entry an Impressionism conference at the into production (at the University of Courtauld (London); in February, Chicago Press) of her book, Illuminated she chaired two sessions at the CAA Paris: Essays on Art and Lighting in the Annual Conference in Los Angeles (“Art Belle Époque. Historians Making Art”); in March, she lectured at Penn (on Impressionist printmaking) and at Harvard (on the Eiffel Tower, and co-taught with Professor Clayson at Vaux-sur-Somme, Jennifer Roberts in her “Minding France, with replica of the Red Baron plane. Making” and “Critical Printing” courses); in March and May, she Huey Copeland Professor Copeland with (from left to right) Anne M. Wagner, Mark Canuel, and T.J. Clark at UIC for the February 6, 2018 seminar, “Cézanne and the Fetishism of Commodities.” Black Modernisms. Copeland continued to present new work at venues including ArtCenter College of Design, Johns Hopkins University, and the Museu de Arte de Saõ Paulo, which will publish his work in Portuguese for the first time in conjunction with the exhibition Histórias Afro-Atlânticas. He also 2017-18 was a season of beginnings Men and Artistic Practice, 1966-2016, published pieces in October, Artforum, and returns for Huey Copeland, forthcoming from the University of the online journal ASAP/J—his initial who rejoined the faculty after a Chicago Press. In Winter 2018, he foray onto a digital platform—while successful tenure as an Associate Dean organized a series of events with continuing to work on his book In the in The Graduate School. In the fall, South African artist and critic Athi Arms of the Negress: Modern Artistic Copeland joined the board of Iceberg Mongelezeli Joja as part of the Critical Practice in the Transatlantic World. Projects, an independent gallery Theory Cluster’s Global South Inter- Copeland looks forward to a research focusing on queer, black, and Chicago University Teaching Cooperation. In the leave next year, which will enable artists. He also traveled to Stockholm spring, Copeland was appointed Chair further progress on three book-length where he received the Absolut Art of the CASVA Board of Advisors and projects. Writing Award for his collection of began work with UCLA Professor Steven essays Touched by the Mother: On Black Nelson on the commissioned volume 2 Faculty News Stephen Eisenman Stephen F. Eisenman‘s exhibition at records. The book for the exhibition, the Block Museum, William Blake published by Princeton University and the Age of Aquarius, which opened in Press, was named by New York Times September 2017, broke all attendance senior art critic Holland Cotter one of the ten best art books of 2017. In November, Eisenman also published a major article entitled “Black Ops in Art and History” in the peer-reviewed journal Visual History. It was published to mark the 10th anniversary of the appearance of his book, The Abu Ghraib Effect (Reaktion Books, 2007). At the beginning of the year, Eisenman’s environmental non-profit organi- zation, Anthropocene Alliance, was awarded a major, three-year grant from William Blake and the Age of Aquarius the Kresge Foundation. He has lectured (Princeton University Press, 2017) and Professor Eisenman introducing at multiple venues this year, most Saree Makdisi at the Block Museum recently at NYU at a conference called (image courtesy of the Block “Animals and the Left.” Museum of Art, Northwestern University). Jesús Escobar This past year, Jesús Escobar brought together scholars from near taught an undergraduate lecture and far for an event held at the Graham course on European Architecture and Foundation and the NU Library. Urbanism, 1600 to 1750 and a gradu- Additionally, he worked to secure a ate-undergraduate seminar on Maps in $1.8 million grant from the Mellon the Early Modern Transatlantic World. Foundation to support the renewal of The latter course allowed students COSI. Escobar continued his work as to work first-hand with objects in Editorial Board Member for the Grove Chicagoland collections including Encyclopedia of Latin American Art and the Newberry Library, MacLean Map contributed an essay for the catalog Collection, and Adler Planetarium. of an exhibition that opened in May He chaired a panel at the Annual celebrating the 400th anniversary of Conference of the Renaissance Society Madrid’s Plaza Mayor. Now that he has of America (RSA) in New Orleans wrapped up his tenure as Department and delivered two papers at the CAA Chair, Escobar intends to complete a Annual Conference in Los Angeles, the book manuscript in September and first related to a new research project launch a new research project about Detail of a map of Mexico City, ca. 1750 (Museo Nacional de Historia, and the second for a session held in architecture and institutions in the Castillo de Chapultepec, Mexico City), memory of an inspirational undergrad- early modern Spanish Empire which illustrating one of the principal sites of uate teacher, Hilary Ballon. On campus, will take him to Mexico, Italy, and Professor Escobar’s new research. Escobar co-organized with Professors Spain. Hu and Levin the symposium, “Entangled Urbanisms: History, Place, and the Shaping of Cities,” which 3 Faculty News Hannah Feldman Hannah Feldman returned from historiography in relationship to art and She also collaborated with the artist sabbatical to resume teaching and, aesthetic discourse in the contemporary Charles Gaines to lecture and lead a from winter onwards, her former post Middle East. In the fall, she was invited to seminar about secularism and critique as Director of Undergraduate Studies. Saudi Arabia as a member of a cultural at the Glassell School of Art, where she Her research brought her to Lebanon, delegation asked to engage and advise is appointed the 2018-20 Scholar-in- France, and Sharjah where she advanced the emerging contemporary art scene Residence at the CORE Program. In the progress on several projects, including her in that country, including the MiSK Art spring, she delivered the Dr. Allen W. new book, The History of the Future, which Institute, an artist-centered cultural Root Contemporary Art Distinguished concerns globalization, temporality, and institution just established by Prince Lecture at the Hood Museum, Dartmouth Mohammed bin Salman. She completed University, where she spoke about the a French translation of a chapter from her speculative museums imagined by the first book, From a Nation Torn: Decolonizing artists Walid Raad and Yto Barrada. In Art and Representation in France, 1945-1962, September, she will teach the Summer and an essay about Lebanese conceptual Seminar Abroad in Beirut in collaboration photography.

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