
Exhibitions and Events
Cannupa Hanska Luger 'GIFTS' U-M campus with public art installation
Jamie Sherman Blinder
Exhibitions and Events
By Natsume Ono
Many events and exhibitions had to shift to a virtual format this semester, but luckily, that means many of them are still available to enjoy online. In the coming weeks, we are highlighting some of the top events and exhibitions from this semester that you can revisit, in case you missed it.
The painted mural from Meleko Mokgosi’s Pan-African Pulp installation at UMMA.
In Pan-African Pulp, Botswana-born artist Meleko Mokgosi explores the history of Pan-Africanism, the global movement to unite ethnic groups of sub-Saharan African descent. His Vertical Gallery installation, which inaugurates a new biennial commission program at UMMA, features large-scale panels inspired by African photo novels of the 1960s and ’70s, a mural examining the complexity of blackness, and posters from Pan-African movements from around the world. The page also features the Oral History Project, showing students’ English retellings of Mokgosi’s Setswana stories.
This year’s DEI summit provided a time and space for the campus community to come together to demonstrate a collective commitment to anti-racism that this moment in our history compels. During the fall term Democracy & Debate theme semester, the DEI Summit focused on the arts as a vehicle for social change and provided an opportunity for curricular integration and connection. Both the theme semester and the Summit confirmed our civic engagement values and demonstrated the power of each voice–both at the ballot box and through creative expression.
The online DEI Summit Creative Gallery showcases work from the U-M community that relates to diversity, equity, and inclusion. This photo was submitted by Kevin McCawley, a graduate student/postdoc at the U-M Medical School.
Thanks to a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the U-M Institute for the Humanities supported Sarah Rose Sharp’s work on Results and Roses during the summer of 2020. After a postponed opening due to COVID-19, U-M humanities has shifted to presenting the work online as a virtual exhibition.
“Detroit Patchwork III” is a piece in Sarah Rose Sharp’s exhibition “Results or Roses: New and Assorted Works” and is now on view at the Humanities Online Gallery.
Enjoy a special holiday reprise of the Takács Quartet’s recent UMS Digital Presentation, featuring works by Florence Price, Mozart, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Bartók, and Debussy.
Originally aired in a free UMS digital presentation in October, the Takács Quartet’s program is available to watch again for a limited time.
Featuring a variety of U-M choral groups, this annual event was shifted to a virtual format this year. Grand Night for Singing focused on the themes of community and connection, with repertoire including traditional songs that speak to our need for communal singing such as “I Was Glad” by Sir Charles Hubert Parry and “How Can I Keep from Singing” arranged by Karen Thomas. It also featured new social justice songs such as Alysia Lee’s “Say Her Name” and Melanie Demore’s “Lead with Love.”
This virtual lecture, given by Dr. Allison Lange of the Wentworth Institute of Technology, is based on her book, “Picturing Political Power: Images in the Women’s Suffrage Movement.” In this talk, Dr. Lange discusses the use of photographs by suffragists that captured their public protests and demonstrated their dedication to their cause for mass audiences.
On Nov. 7, Allison K. Lange, assistant professor of history at the Wentworth Institute of Technology, delivered a virtual talk about the woman’s suffrage movement through photographs.
The Fall 2020 Raoul Wallenberg Lecture featured Michael Kimmelman of the New York Times. Kimmelman’s remarks, in conversation with Dean Jonathan Massey, were then followed by a public interview with Taubman College’s Agora and Dimensions publications, exploring the role of journalists in issues of racial justice, social equity, health, and climate change in the context of the built environment.
Exhibitions and Events
Jamie Sherman Blinder