Social Justice

Acclaimed Chinese dissident artist and activist Ai Weiwei joined Sabine Eckmann, William T. Kemper Director and Chief Curator of the Kemper Art Museum, for a conversation on Ai’s wide-ranging and critical practice.

Noted media studies scholar and game designer, Ian Bogost, presented three talks exploring the theory and concepts of play and games under the auspices of the 2021 Humanities Series.

As Kevin Ray, a legal expert in the field of cultural assets, notes, there’s a popular saying that bad artists imitate, but great artists steal. In the contemporary art world, the act of using some or all of another artist’s (or musician’s or author’s) work in the process of making your own new work is usually described as “appropriation.”

The 2020-2021 Paul and Silvia Rava lecture titled “Families of Worlds” featured Antony Shugaar.

Legendary writer Joy Williams had a special reading and conversation about her first novel in 20 years, “Harrow.” The event also celebrated her literary papers and the “Joy Williams: Honored Guest” exhibition in Olin Library and online.

One of the many research interests of Sue Vice, who teaches contemporary literature, literary theory, culture, and film at the University of Sheffield, is the representation of the Holocaust. As this year’s Holocaust Memorial Lecturer, Vice will draw on her extensive knowledge of the varied forms of Holocaust literature and film that have entered the public realm, and discuss what the most recent examples suggest about Holocaust memory today.

Christiane Gruber’s research interests span medieval Islamic art to contemporary visual culture and predominantly focus on Islamic book arts, paintings of the Prophet Muhammad, and Islamic ascension texts and images. In her talk, “The Praiseworthy One: Devotional Images of the Prophet Muhammad in Islamic Traditions,” Gruber will explore the ways in which, within a variety of Islamic expressive cultures, artists and viewers alike used pictorial language to express devotion to the Prophet Muhammad.

On October 28, 2014 at 5 p.m. in Graham Chapel, Nobel Laureate Eric Kandel talked about “The Age of Insight: The Quest to Understand the Unconscious in Art, Mind and Brain from Vienna 1900 to the Present.”

Three WashU experts explore how drone technology is changing our world in a discussion that promises to bring intriguing insights. “Technology, Ethics, and Laws” featuring Humberto Gonzalez, Neil Richards, and Meredith Malone, at 5:30 p.m. March 31 in Steinberg Auditorium. At 5 p.m. please join us for a reception and viewing of the exhibition on which the discussion will be based: “To See Without Being Seen: Contemporary Art and Drone Warfare,” in the Kemper Art Museum.

Daniel Libeskind, one of the most celebrated architects working today, will discuss “The Future of Cities” as part of the Assembly Series at Washington University in St. Louis. His presentation, sponsored by the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts and the Architecture Student Council, will begin at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 2, in Graham Chapel.

At 4 p.m. Thursday, April 11, Kathleen Coleman will give an Assembly Series talk that paints a real picture of the Roman arena spectacle, explaining Roman penal theory and practice regarding Christian martyrdom in the context of the expectations and attitudes of both the Roman authorities and audiences. Coleman’s talk, the annual John and Penelope Biggs Lecture in the Classics, will be held in Steinberg Hall Auditorium on Washington University’s Danforth Campus; it is free and open to the public.

Block is a native of Plano, Texas now living in Brooklyn. His novels have been translated into 10 languages, and his stories and non-fiction have appeared in many publications, including “The New York Times,” “The Guardian,” “GRANTA,” and “The New Yorker’s” Page-Turner; and on NPR’s Radiolab.

On November 7, 2014 internationally distinguished architect, Nasrine Seraji delivered the keynote address for the School of Architecture’s symposium on “Women in Architecture: 1974-2014.” The title of her talk was “As a Woman I Have No Country, as a Woman My Country is the World of Architecture.”

On November 30, 2021 St.Louis-born performing artist and civil rights activist Josephine Baker became the first woman of color to be inducted into France’s Pantheon.

In thinking about what we want for ourselves and for those about whom we care, we tend to think in terms of the categories of self-interest and morality. We want, in other words, to be both happy and good. These categories, however, leave something out: an interest that our lives be meaningful.