One World, Double Take
A series of roundtable discussions where media insiders, curious creatives, and big thinkers share their perspectives on global hot-button issues.
Sunday, November 14, 4 PM | Pay-What-You-Can
Alumni Hall (Room 112), Victoria College Building, University of Toronto, 91 Charles St. W
Responding to themes of the Koffler Gallery’s fall project, MIXEDFIT, a panel of artists moderated by the Koffler's fall scholar-in-residence Professor David Shneer looks at cultures and creators who cross boundaries; geographic, societal and artistic. What is the result of ever-increasing internationalism and hyphenated identities on shaping identity and cultural output?
David Shneer together with:
Presented together with the Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies, University of Toronto.
[Image: Millie Chen, wallpaper, from MIXEDFIT, 2010].
ABOUT THE PANELISTS
Called a "taboo-breaking scholar" by Tikkun magazine, David Shneer's work concentrates on modern Jewish society and culture. He is the former director of the Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Denver. His books include Queer Jews, finalist for the Lambda Literary award, Yiddish and the Creation of Soviet Jewish Culture, finalist for the National Jewish Book Award, and New Jews: The End of the Jewish Diaspora, that has sparked discussion in publications like the Economist and the Jerusalem Post. His newest book project, Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War, & the Holocaust, looks at the lives and works of two dozen World War II military photographers to examine what kinds of photographs they took when they encountered evidence of Nazi genocide on the Eastern Front. He has lived and worked as a scholar and writer in Russia, Germany, and Israel and has written for the New York Times, Huffington Post, Rocky Mountain News and the Denver Post as well as magazines dedicated to Jewish life and culture, including Forward, Pakntreger, Jewcy, and Nextbook. Shneer has taught or been a scholar-in-residence at the University of California campuses at Berkeley and Davis, and at the University of Illinois, the National Yiddish Book Center, the University of Wisconsin, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, serving as the Pearl Resnick Fellow, and the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley.
Millie Chen exhibits and lectures internationally. She has exhibited her work across North America, in the U.S., Canada and Mexico, in Brazil, France, the Netherlands, Northern Ireland, Japan and across China. Recently, she showed as part of Sound Symposium, St. John’s, Newfoundland, Toronto nuit blanche, Reverberation: 2008 International Video Art Exhibition at Yuangong Art Museum, Shanghai, Tank Loft Contemporary Art Center, Chongqing, and Museum of Contemporary Art, Shijiazhuang, FILE-Rio 2007: Electronic Language International Festival, Rio de Janeiro, and in concurrent solo exhibitions in France at the Centre d’art contemporain de Basse-Normandie and Centre cultural canadien, Paris. Her practice encompasses curating and publishing. Her writing has appeared in publications in the U.K., Canada and the U.S. She is the recipient of numerous awards and research/production grants, including a Chalmers Fellowship through the Ontario Arts Council to produce a video installation based on two river journeys down the Yangtze in China and the Niagara in Canada/USA. Chen has produced a number of major permanent public art commissions, and her work is in several public collections. She is Chair and Associate Professor at the Department of Visual Studies, University at Buffalo, SUNY.
Arthur Renwick is a photo-based artist and independent curator who teaches in both the Integrated 2D Media and Photography Departments at Guelph University. His art practice combines photography with traditional and industrial materials to explore the relationship between cultural identity and colonial development and to address the impact of industry on landscape and culture. In the past year, he has exhibited at Jack Shainman Gallery, NYC, Le Mois de la Photo, Montreal, and Urban Shaman in Winnipeg. He has taught at the White Mountain Academy of the Arts, and the Ontario College of Art and Design. He has worked in a curatorial capacity at The Power Plant in Toronto, and as Assistant Curator at the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Ottawa. Exhibiting nationally and internationally, his work is represented in many private and public collections including the National Gallery of Canada. His artwork is represented by Leo Kamen Gallery in Toronto.
Marika Schwandt is an actor, dancer, and creator from Winnipeg, based in Toronto. She works hard to channel her truth into original collaborations, and is happy to share her unique skills and energy. Marika is also: Co-Artistic Director of a young multi-arts company called The Movement Project; a member of the rAiz’n ensemble, the performance and training arm of b current performing arts; Playwright in Residence with Mammalian Diving Reflex; and one half of PMV? Apparel (www.pmvapparel.com), a streetwear line that celebrates mixed-race identity in screen print designs. Marika has been awarded several grants from the Ontario Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts. Recent work as creator/performer: MULATTO NATION, Beauty Project, How We Forgot Here, The Art of Catching Pigeons by Torchlight. You can also catch Marika on the small screen in several national commercial spots. www.emarika.com
|
| Location: | Alumni Hall, Victoria College, U of T, 91 Charles St West |