Exhibition Reception!

Carol & Robert Bush Art Center
St. Norbert College
403 3rd St, De Pere, WI 54115

Free and open to the public. All are welcome!

SOTU 2024!

Imagining Human Rights

To kick off the Imagining Human Rights series of events celebrating the 75th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Aaron Hughes and Pablo Mendoza will deliver a virtual lecture on October 3rd at noon. Aaron Hughes & Pablo Mendoza are part of the Prison + Neighborhood Arts / Education Project (P+NAP). They will discuss their work with P+NAP and the Carving Out Rights project that engages prisoners with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and their efforts to create a culture of human rights from below.

This lecture is part of the Imagining Human Rights Programming Celebrating the 75th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Sponsored by the Cassandra Voss Center and the Art Department with additional support from the Humanities Division and the Norman Miller Center for Peace, Justice, & Public Understanding.  

Lecture Video: https://vimeo.com/showcase/8157530/video/870851558

Art & Society Lectures Spring 2023

As a part of the ART 205: Art, Technology, & Society course at St. Norbert College, Associate Professor Brandon Bauer is hosting a lecture series supported by the Norman Miller Center for Peace, Justice, and Public Understanding.

The schedule is as follows:

Sky Hopinka – Thursday, March 9th at Noon

Sky Hopinka is a Native American visual artist, filmmaker, and member of the Ho-Chunk Nation who has developed new forms of cinema from the perspectives of Indigenous people. He is a MacArthur Fellow for his work offering new strategies of representation for expressing Indigenous worldviews. His work Kunįkága Remembers Red Banks, Kunįkága Remembers the Welcome Song will be on display in the Media Space Gallery from February 13 – March 31.

Lecture Link: https://snc-edu.zoom.us/j/81442912568?pwd=L5R1VhzCZL5TeQsyYsbCYeHKUQx3N0.1

Jill Magid – Thursday, April 20th at Noon

Jill Magid explores emotional, philosophical, and legal tensions between individuals and institutions. She created the work Tender evoking the connection between the human body and the body politic through the circulation of 120,000 newly minted 2020 edge-engraved pennies as a nearly invisible public artwork.

Lecture Link: https://snc-edu.zoom.us/j/81442912568?pwd=L5R1VhzCZL5TeQsyYsbCYeHKUQx3N0.1

Art & Democracy Events Fall 2022

Let Us Vote Banner by Aram Han Sifuentes

In the Bush Art Center Galleries

Let Us Vote! by Aram Han Sifuentes

Baer Gallery: October 3 – October 27, 2022 Exhibition Reception – October 20

This exhibition brings together works by Aram Han Sifuentes that focus on democracy, citizenship, and political participation. The works in this exhibition manifest the notion of democracy as a contested space in which one can gain a political voice through citizenship, protest, or giving voice to those excluded politically. Sifuentes’s work investigates identity politics, immigration, citizenship and belonging, dissent and protest, and racial politics in the United States today. 

A Call To Halt by Brandon Bauer

Permanent Collection Gallery: September 26 – October 27, 2022

A Call To Halt is an installation and critical timeline of the Euromissiles Crisis, and the nuclear abolition movement in the United States from 1977-1987. The installation includes a reenactment of the 1982 Nuclear Freeze Referenda, in which Wisconsin was the first in the nation to put international nuclear disarmament policy to a popular vote.

Angry Sandwich People or in Praise of Dialectics by Chto Delat?

Media Space Gallery: August 29 – October 27, 2022

In this piece, the Russian art collective Chto Delat? (What is to be done?) imagines protest as a form of theatrical happening in urban space by bringing to life Bertolt Brecht’s poem “In Praise of Dialectics”. The action was carried out in close collaboration with two local activist groups, Worker’s Democracy and The Pyotr Alexeev Resistance Movement at Stachek Square, an important historic site where in 1905 striking workers marched on the Winter Palace. 


Art & Society Lectures and Events

September 6 – Aram Han Sifuentes Virtual lecture (Zoom) @ Noon

Aram Han Sifuentes is a fiber and social practice artist who works to claim spaces for immigrant and disenfranchised communities. Her work often revolves around skill sharing, specifically sewing techniques, to create multiethnic and intergenerational sewing circles, which become a place for empowerment, subversion, and protest. This lecture is associated with her exhibition in the Bush Art Center Galleries. 

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/747093645

September 13 – Dmitry Vilensky Virtual lecture (Zoom) @ Noon

Dmitry Vilensky is an artist, writer, and founding member of the Russian art collective Chto Delat? (What is to be done?), a platform initiated in 2003 by a collective of artists, critics, philosophers, and writers with the goal of merging political theory, art, and activism.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/749296915

September 22 – U.S. Department of Arts and Culture (USDAC) Virtual lecture (Zoom) @ Noon

Founded in 2013 The U.S. Department of Arts and Culture (USDAC) is a “people-powered department” (not a federal agency) committed to supporting individuals and organizations in mobilizing creativity in the service of justice.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/753034223

September 28 – Center for Artistic Activism lecture (BAC 130) 1:10 – 2:10 pm 

The Center for Artistic Activism has helped to build, sustain, and develop the field of artistic activism since its inception in 2009 through innovative research and by providing free resources and training to artists and organizations around the world.

October 20 – Get Out The Vote Banner Making Workshop with Moki Tantoco @ Noon in the Mulva Library First Floor Flex Space

This banner-making workshop is in association with the Aram Han Sifuentes Exhibition in the Bush Art Center Galleries. Moki Tantoco has collaborated with Aram Han Sifuentes and will lead this banner making workshop. Moki is an arts administrator, educator, and artist based in Illinois who encourages exploring socially engaged art practices through writing, performance, and installation.

November 15 – Oliver Ressler Zoom Virtual lecture (Zoom) @ Noon

Oliver Ressler is an artist who lives and works in Vienna, Austria. He produces theme-specific exhibitions, projects in the public space, and videos on issues such as democracy, capitalism, and social alternatives to our existing political realities. His work blurs the boundaries between art and activism.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/771346605

November 17 – Jonas Staal Zoom Virtual lecture (Zoom) @ Noon

Jonas Staal is a Dutch visual artist. His work deals with the relationship between art, democracy, and propaganda.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/772195435


Special Thanks to The Norman Miller Center for Peace, Justice, & Public Understanding, The Sturzl Center for Community Service and Learning, The Honors Program, The Office of Student Inclusion and Belonging, The Mulva Library, the Bush Art Center Galleries, and the Art Department for support of this programming.

ART, TECHNOLOGY, & SOCIETY GUEST LECTURES (SP2022)

As a part of the ART 205: Art, Technology, & Society course at St. Norbert College, Associate Professor Brandon Bauer is hosting a lecture series that was supported by the Faculty Mini-Grant Program through the Norman Miller Center for Peace, Justice, and Public Understanding.

The schedule is as follows:

Thursday, February 24th at noon – Kite (aka Suzanne Kite)
Kite is an Oglala Lakota performance artist, visual artist, and composer, a PhD candidate at Concordia University, Research Assistant for the Initiative for Indigenous Futures, a 2019 Trudeau Scholar, and a 2020 Tulsa Artist Fellow. Her research is concerned with contemporary Lakota ontologies through research-creation, computational media, and performance practice.
Website: http://kitekitekitekite.com/

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/681551994/04dc653e6c

Thursday, March 10th at noon – Paolo Cirio
Paolo Cirio is an Italian conceptual artist, hacktivist, and cultural critic currently living in New York. Cirio’s work embodies hacker ethics, such as open access, privacy policies, and the critique of economic, legal, and political models. He shows his research and intervention-based works through artifacts, photos, installations, videos, and public art. He exhibits internationally and has won several prestigious awards, grants, commissions, and fellowships.
Website: https://www.paolocirio.net/

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/686840449/debd07d51d

Thank you to Cara Orbell for the poster!

Art in a Democratic Society Lecture Series (FA2021)

As a part of the ART 285: Art in a Democratic Society course at St. Norbert College, Associate Professor Brandon Bauer is hosting a lecture series that was supported by the Faculty Mini-Grant Program through the Norman Miller Center for Peace, Justice, and Public Understanding.

The schedule is as follows:

Tuesday, September 13th – Aram Han Sifuentes

Aram Han Sifuentes is a fiber and social practice artist who works to claim spaces for immigrant and disenfranchised communities. Her work often revolves around skill sharing, specifically sewing techniques, to create multiethnic and intergenerational sewing circles, which become a place for empowerment, subversion and protest.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/606656249/cc9ae39619

Tuesday, October 5th – U.S. Department of Arts and Culture

Founded in 2013 The U.S. Department of Arts and Culture (USDAC) is a “people-powered department” (not a federal agency) committed to supporting individuals and organizations in mobilizing creativity in the service of justice. While social issues may be grounded in politics and economics, the USDAC believes that to change the world we need to change the story. Images, language, and attitudes affect our ability to understand and act on the challenges we face as a society.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/623734181/35e19637b4

Tuesday, November 16th – Valeria Mogilevich

Valeria is a designer and educator working at the intersection of education, design, and community engagement. She specializes in demystifying policy, authentic engagement strategies, collaboration, experiential education, and working with immigrant communities. Valeria has collaborated on visual “explainers”, curricula, community engagement strategies, and public artworks with grassroots organizations, government agencies, and cultural institutions.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/646607880/a555db5690

Tuesday, November 23rd – Matthijs de Bruijne

Matthijs de Bruijne’s practice is a result of direct political involvement. In recent years it has taken the form of collaboration with trade unions and other labor organizations. In 2010 he was invited by the Dutch Union of Cleaners to work as an artist helping this worker’s led organization to visualize their messages in a clear manner and by creating a recognizable identity for this union in the Netherlands. Since 2020 he has been creating the archive of this union which will be gifted to the International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/649194271/dbcbebdc41

Thank you to Grace Liska-Verdu for the poster!

Artist Talk with Aaron Renier

Join us for an artist talk with cartoonist and illustrator Aaron Renier. The talk will be via zoom. See the information at the bottom of this post to join the call.

Aaron Renier is the author of three graphic novels for younger readers; Spiral-Bound, Walker Bean, and Walker Bean and the Knights of the Waxing Moon. He is the recipient of the Eisner award in 2006 for talent deserving of wider recognition, and was an inaugural resident for the Sendak Fellowship in 2010. He also illustrates children’s books, most notably for the authors Dave Eggers (The Lifters, 2018) and Daniel Pinkwater (Vampires of Blinsh, and Adventures of a Dwergish Girl, both 2020). 

Zoom link: https://snc-edu.zoom.us/j/83477655617?pwd=SW1wK2xPZ1hlbm5YYWFrdmJPanhvUT09

You must have an @snc.edu email address to join this talk.

Artist talk with Illustrator Lauren Lowen

Join us today/Thursday, March 4th to hear from illustrator and podcast host, Lauren Lowen, as she talks about surface design, licensing work, and how she got to be where she is.

Zoom link:
https://snc-edu.zoom.us/j/87566106872?pwd=dFJ0U3JRMFI3cWZDRjgxU2wrblpCUT09


You must have an SNC email to join this talk.

Art, Technology, & Society Lecture Series (SP2021)

As a part of the ART 205: Art, Technology, & Society course at St. Norbert College, Associate Professor Brandon Bauer is hosting a lecture series that was supported by the Faculty Mini-Grant Program through the Norman Miller Center for Peace, Justice, and Public Understanding.

The schedule is as follows:

Thursday, February 18th @ Noon – Mark Tribe 

Mark Tribe is a New York-based artist and Graduate Programs Chair at the School of the Visual Arts in New York. His drawings, performances, installations, and photographs often deal with social and political issues. His recent work explores the relationship between landscape and technology. He is the author of two books, The Port Huron Project: Reenactments of New Left Protest Speeches (Charta, 2010) and New Media Art (Taschen, 2006).

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/514367522/34bf4e17d3

Thursday, March 11th @ Noon – Constance Hockaday

Constance Hockaday is a Chilean American artist whose work explores issues of public space, political voice, and belonging. Hockaday holds both an MFA in Socially Engaged Art and a Masters in Conflict Resolution. She is a TED Fellow and an artist in residence at UCLA. She has received support from the Rauschenberg Foundation, Map Fund, SF MOMA, Rainin Foundation, and Headland’s Center for the Arts.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/522492403/a3b4f0654f

Thursday, March 25th @ Noon – jackie sumell

Jackie Sumell is a multidisciplinary artist and activist whose work interrogates the abuses of the American criminal justice system. She is best known for her collaborative project with the late Herman Wallace, one of the former Angola 3 prisoners, entitled The House That Herman Built. This project is the subject of the critically acclaimed documentary film Herman’s House. Sumell is a 2013 Open Society Soros Justice Fellow, a 2015 Nathan Cummings Foundation Recipient, a 2015 Eyebeam Project Fellow, and a 2016 Robert Rauchenberg Artist as Activist Fellow.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/528992142/6f6a451d28

Tuesday, April 6th @ Noon – Jonas Lund

Jonas Lund is a Swedish conceptual artist whose work critically reflects on contemporary networked systems and power structures. Lund’s artistic practice involves creating systems and setting up parameters that oftentimes require engagement from the viewer. This results in game-like artworks where tasks are executed according to algorithms or a set of rules. Through his works, Lund investigates the issues generated by the increasing digitalization of contemporary society like authorship, participation, and authority.

Lecture Link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/534508938/7aa366ed9b

Thursday, April 22 @ Noon – Claudia X. Valdes

Claudia X. Valdes a conceptual visual artist and educator who explores the themes of trauma, memory, perception, and embodiment in her work. Major subjects within her works have been the history of U.S. nuclear arms, physical trauma, violent conflict, and positing art as a means to both catalyze and frame social spaces for meaningful discourse and to evoke reflection upon the ethics of human decision-making and actions and their impact on individual and collective life.

This lecture was not recorded.

Thank you to Neale Tracy for the poster!

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