THE NEW SCHOOL PUBLIC PROGRAMS: ART AND DESIGN
SPRING 2007

NEW YORK, January 6, 2007—This spring, The New School, including Parsons The New School for Design and The Vera List Center for Art and Politics presents a range of events in the fields of art and design.

Among the highlights, Parsons will present lectures by noted designers, critics, writers and artists including art critic Roberta Smith (Feb. 7), artist Justine Kurland (Feb. 21), fashion designers Isabel and Ruben Toledo (Mar. 6), noted author and educator Frances Richard on Gordon-Matta Clark (Mar. 14), BusinessWeek editor Bruce Nussbaum (Mar. 15), artist Jules de Balincourt (Apr. 11), and artist Robert Boyd (May 2). In conjunction with the Center for Communication, Parsons will also present a panel discussion on graphic design featuring leading designers Steven Heller and Mirko Ill? (Mar. 28).

In collaboration with the Aperture Foundation, The New School will present Behind the Faces of Fashion (Feb. 21), exploring the intersection of fashion and art, with W creative director Dennis Freedman, art critic Vince Aletti, and fashion photographers Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin, moderated by Parsons fashion chair Tim Gunn. A second panel will present legendary British photography duo Gilbert & George (May 9).

The Vera List Center will also present several panel discussions on the intersection of art and politics. With the Center for Book Arts, the school will present Visualizing Iraqi Politics and Cultures, in conjunction with the exhibition Dafatir: Contemporary Iraqi Book Art (Feb. 16). With the International Center of Photography, the school will present Photography Today: Taking Sides in Conflict (Feb. 23), featuring photojournalists who work in areas of conflict such as Iraq and Israel/Palestinian territories. High Times, Hard Times (Apr. 5), in conjunction with the exhibition at the National Academy Museum, will explore politics, race and feminism in the art world as they emerged in the 1960s. Public Domain: Folk Art (Apr. 28), will explore how the government has instrumentalized folk art for political purposes.

In the area of architecture and sustainable design, Parsons will present China Dialogues (Feb. 8) in conjunction with the MoMA exhibition OMA in Beijing; as well as Jean Rogers, Ove Arup and Partners (Feb. 27), who will discuss sustainable development of buildings and communities; and Majora Carter, Sustainable South Bronx (April 2), who will discuss sustainability and environmental justice.

In celebration of the 10th anniversary of Design and Technology at Parsons, the school will present Ten Years Running (Apr. 5), featuring work by prominent alumni and faculty of the program. Parsons Does Sims (Apr. 19) will present student works inspired by the popular video game The Sims, including machinima (using a game engine to produce animations or films), physical computing, interactive media, three-dimensional printing and traditional media.

EDITOR’S NOTE: A FULL CALENDAR OF EVENTS IS ATTACHED. All public programs are subject to change.

FINE ARTS LECTURE SERIES: ROBERTA SMITH
Wednesday, February 7, 3:15–5:00 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, Swayduck Auditorium, 65 Fifth Avenue
Admission: Free
The Department of Fine Arts at Parsons The New School for Design presents Roberta Smith, senior art critic for The New York Times, who will speak about her work as a critic and other art world topics. A writer for The New York Times since 1986, Smith has also written for Art in America, Artforum, and Arts Magazine. She has written insightful essays for numerous catalogs, including shows by painters Cy Twombly, Elizabeth Murray, and Jennifer Bartlett. In 2003, she was honored with the prestigious College Art Association’s Frank Jewell Mather Award for Art Criticism.

CHINA DIALOGUES
Thursday, February 8, 6:00–8:00 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, Wollman Hall, 65 West 11th Street, 5th floor (enter at 66 West 12th Street).
Admission: Free. RSVP to [email protected].
In conjunction with the exhibition “OMA in Beijing” at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Parsons The New School for Design, in conjunction with the MoMA, presents a panel discussion on the emerging East-West architectural discourse and rapid urbanization of China. Panelists include Chinese architect Yung Ho Chang, Professor of Architecture and Head of the Department of Architecture at MIT; Tina Di Carlo, assistant curator, department of architecture and design, MoMA; Ole Scheeren, architect and designer, OMA, and Jianying Zha, author.

VISUALIZING IRAQI POLITICS AND CULTURES IN IRAQ AND THE DIASPORA
Friday, February 16, 6:30 p.m.
The New School, Wollman Hall, 65 West 11th St., 5th Fl. (enter at 66 West 12th St.)
Admission: Free for the Center for Book Arts members and New School students and faculty; $10 for general public; $5 for students and faculty.
In the 1960s and 1970s, Baghdad emerged as a vital cultural center in the Arab world. After the devastation of the Hussein regime, and the developing civil war, how do Iraqi artists today cope with the daily physical? The Vera List Center for Art and Politics at The New School and The Center for Book Arts in conjunction with their exhibition Dafatir: Contemporary Iraqi Book Art presents a panel discussion moderated by exhibition curator Nada Shabout a leading authority on Iraqi contemporary art and a consultant to the U.S. Department of State Cultural Antiquities Task Force, explores the proliferation of the book as an art form pursued by contemporary Iraqi artists; the relationship between Islamic manuscripts and contemporary book art, notions of identity and resistance to the erasure of identity, and the experience of exile. Panelists include with Hashim al-Tawil, professor of Art History at Henry Ford Community College and lecturer in Islamic Art and Architecture and Arab Studies at the University of Michigan-Dearborn; Sharokin Betgevargiz, lecturer in History of Graphic Design at Central Connecticut State University whose work documents historic and contemporary photos and text in English and in Assyrian, Ella Shohat, professor, Art and Public Policy and Middle Eastern Studies at New York University; and Michael Rakowitz, associate professor in Art Theory and Practice at Northwestern University, whose Iraqi Jewish family was exiled from Iraq in 1946.  Following the panel discussion, a reception with an opportunity to view the exhibition will be held at the Center for Book Arts, 28 West 27th Street.

FINE ARTS LECTURE SERIES: JUSTINE KURLAND
Wednesday, February 21, 3:15–5:00 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, Swayduck Auditorium, 65 Fifth Avenue.
Admission: Free.
The Department of Fine Arts at Parsons The New School for Design presents Justine Kurland, whose photographs examine and create fantasies of utopian community, typically capturing inspired loners or gangs of girls in landscapes that are sometimes lushly pastoral and at other times insidiously poisoned by industrial decay. Kurland’s photographs have been exhibited at museums and galleries in the United States and internationally. She received her BFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York in 1996 and her MFA from Yale University in 1998.

CONFOUNDING EXPECTATIONS: PHOTOGRAPHY IN CONTEXT 5: BEHIND THE FACES OF FASHION
Wednesday, February 21, 7:00 p.m.
The New School, Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street
Admission: Free
The Aperture Foundation, in collaboration with the Photography Department at Parsons The New School for Design and the Vera List Center for Art and Politics at The New School, presents a panel representing various facets of the fashion industry who will discuss ways that fashion photography and art collide, coinciding with the exhibition Face of Fashion on view at the National Portrait Gallery, London, and the co-publication of the accompanying book by Aperture. Moderated by Tim Gunn, chair of fashion design at Parsons, panelists include Dennis Freedman, creative director, W magazine; Vince Aletti, writer, critic, and contributor to Face of Fashion; and Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin, fashion photographers. This series will continue on May 9, and is made possible through generous support from the Kettering Family Foundation and the Henry Nias Foundation and public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.

PHOTOGRAPHY TODAY: TAKING SIDES IN CONFLICT
Friday, February 23, 6:30 p.m.
The New School, Theresa Lang Community and Student Center, 55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor.
Admission: $5.
When we look at photographs published in a magazine or newspaper, do we ever consider who took the picture or why the photographer was there? The International Center of Photography and the Vera List Center for Art and Politics at The New School, with support in part by Getty Images, present a panel discussion, which will present work from photojournalists who live and work in conflict areas such as the Palestinian Territories and Israel. Moderated by Alison Morley, photo editor and chair, Photojournalism and Documentary Photography, International Center of Photography, panelists include Alexandra Boulat, photojournalist, VII; Michael Robinson Chavez, photojournalist, The Washington Post; Issa Freij, filmmaker and CBS cameraman; and Heidi Levine, Sipa Press and Shaul Schwartz/Getty Images.

ANNUAL STEPHAN WEISS VISITING LECTURESHIP: JEAN ROGERS
Sustainable Development: Changing the Environment to Changing Behavior
Tuesday, February 27, 6:00–7:30 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, Theresa Lang Student and Community Center, 55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor.
Admission: Free. To RSVP, contact 212.229.5391 or [email protected].
Parsons The New School for Design presents Jean Rogers, who leads sustainability planning and design projects for Ove Arup and Partners, an internationally renowned consulting firm practicing design of the built environment. Her clients include Google, Wal-Mart, Westfield, CalPERS, the city of San Francisco, and eco-cities in Asia. Rogers’ lecture will address integrating sustainability into design of buildings and new communities. A reception will follow. The annual Stephan Weiss Visiting Lectureship was launched to commemorate the life of the late artist and sculptor Stephan Weiss, husband and business partner of Parsons alumna, fashion designer Donna Karan.

FORM FOLLOWS FASHION: ISABEL AND RUBEN TOLEDO
Tuesday, March 6, 6:00 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, 560 Seventh Avenue, 2nd floor.
Admission: Free.
Parsons The New School for Design and Jessica Glasscock, curator, present the lecture series “Form Follows Fashion,” which explores issues in fashion and design from multiple perspectives. Isabel and Ruben Toledo, a design team who embody the broad view of fashion’s possibilities with an approach that owes as much to the architect’s designs as the dressmaker’s art, will discuss two decades in fashion and the question of reconciling (or, perhaps, not reconciling) an avant-garde design sensibility with the commercial demands of New York fashion.

FRIDAYS @ 1: LINCOLN CENTER AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE AMERICAN CULTURAL COLOSSUS
Friday, March 9, 1:00 p.m.
The New School, Wollman Hall, 65 West 11th Street, 5th floor (enter at 66 West 12th Street).
Admission: Free. Reservations required, contact 212.229.5682 or [email protected].
The Institute for Retired Professionals presents cultural historian Julia L. Foulkes who will explore the 60-year history and development of Lincoln Center, and its impact on design, the performing arts, and urban planning in the United States, and American culture itself. Foulkes is a cultural historian and the author of Modern Bodies: Dance and American Modernism from Martha Graham to Alvin Ailey and the forthcoming To The City. This program is partially supported by a bequest in memory of Estelle Tolkin.

FINE ARTS LECTURE SERIES: FRANCES RICHARD ON GORDON-MATTA CLARK
Wednesday, March 14, 3:15–5:00 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, Swayduck Auditorium, 65 Fifth Avenue.
Admission: Free.
The Department of Fine Arts at Parsons The New School for Design presents Frances Richard, writer, editor, and educator, who will speak on the work of Gordon-Matta Clark. Matta-Clark is famous for making sculptural cuts into abandoned buildings; work typically seen as a highly physical application of Land Art principles to urban contexts. Connecting such conceptual, language-inflected projects as Fake Estates and Anarchitecture with better-known building-cuts like Splitting, Richard will explore Matta-Clark’s concern with “in-between spaces” as a system through which poetics merge with kinaesthetics and the distinction between words and things productively breaks down. Richard is a member of the editorial group at the art and culture magazine Cabinet and a founding editor of the literary journal Fence. Her critical prose and reviews appear in magazines such as Artforum, BOMB, and the London Review of Books, and she has contributed essays for catalogs produced by institutions including the Guggenheim Museum and the Whitney Museum of American Art.

ANNUAL STEPHAN WEISS VISITING LECTURESHIP: BRUCE NUSSBAUM
Thursday, March 15, 6:00–7:30 p.m.
Theresa Lang Community and Student Center, 55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor.
Admission: Free. To RSVP, please call 212.229.5391 or email [email protected].
Parsons The New School for Design presents an evening with Bruce Nussbaum, a noted authority on the intersection of business and design innovation. Nussbaum serves as an assistant managing editor in charge of the magazine’s innovation and design coverage. In 2005, I.D. Magazine named him one of the 40 most powerful people in design. He has written extensively on innovation and design. The annual Stephan Weiss Visiting Lectureship was launched to commemorate the life of the late artist and sculptor, Stephan Weiss, husband and business partner of Parsons alumna, fashion designer Donna Karan.

BEYOND THE IMAGES: UNDERSTANDING GRAPHIC DESIGN
Wednesday, March 28, 6-8 p.m.
Theresa Lang Student and Community Center, 55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor
Admission: Free
Book and record covers, posters, packages, labels and logos – graphic design surrounds us, conveying messages and promoting products. But good design is often complex and multilayered, the result of myriad influences and inspirations. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of its communication design program, Parsons The New School for Design partners with the Center for Communication to present a panel discussion with leading designers Steven Heller and Mirko Ili?, who will dissect the hidden meanings behind modern graphic design and discuss how aspiring designers can create a fulfilling career. Heller is senior art director of The New York Times and author, editor, and coauthor of more than 100 books on graphic design, illustration, and popular culture. Ili? is a Bosnia-born illustrator and designer and was the art director for Time’s international edition and the art director of the New York Times Op-Ed pages. Ili? and Heller co-authored three books.

FRIDAYS @ 1: NEW YORK’S TERRA COTTA SKYLINE
Friday, March 30, 1:00 p.m.
The New School, Wollman Hall, 65 West 11th Street, 5th floor (enter at 66 West 12th Street).
Admission: Free. Seating is limited, reservations required. Contact 212.229.5682 or [email protected].
The Institute for Retired Professionals presents Susan Tunick, a sculptor, expert in the terra cotta medium, president of the Friends of Terra Cotta, and consultant to major architects. She challenges the notion of New York as a “concrete jungle” by revealing the extraordinary clay ornamentation that adorns so many of our city’s great buildings, ranging from skyscrapers like the Woolworth Building to more modest structures such as the recently landmarked Claremont Theater. She shows us the beautiful designs in architectural terra cotta in New York City and also describes methods of manufacture and current efforts to preserve this rich heritage. This program is partially supported by a bequest in memory of Estelle Tolkin.

THE 2007 MICHAEL KALIL LECTURE ON NATURAL AND TECHNOLOGICAL SYSTEMS: MAJORA CARTER
Monday, April 2, 6:30 8:00 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street
Admission:  Free
The Department of Architecture, Interior Design, and Lighting at Parsons The New School for Design, the Michael Kalil Endowment for Smart Design, and the Tishman Environment and Design Center at The New School presents Majora Carter, who will talk on the topic of sustainability and environmental justice. Carter is executive director and founder of Sustainable South Bronx, which supports environmental justice through innovative, economically sustainable projects that are informed by the needs of the community. Recent projects include a green and cool roof demonstration project and a community-led plan for a bicycle/pedestrian greenway along the South Bronx waterfront providing open space, waterfront access and opportunities for mixed-use economic development in the South Bronx. The Michael Kalil Endowment for Smart Design was established in 2001 in memory of designer and Parsons faculty member Michael Kalil to foster an understanding of the design intersections between nature and technology and supports a heightened sense of responsibility for increasing the sustainability of built environments. The Tishman Environment and Design Center (www.newschool.edu/tedc/) oversees the development of environmental studies at The New School and brings together scholars and students from across the university to research and develop solutions to environmental issues.

ANNUAL STEPHAN WEISS VISITING LECTURESHIP: GENEVIEVE BELL
Tuesday, April 3, 6:00–7:30 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, Theresa Lang Student and Community Center, 55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor.
Admission: Free. To RSVP please contact 212.229.5391 or [email protected].
Parsons The New School for Design presents an evening with Genevieve Bell. An anthropologist by training, Bell works as an ethnographic researcher at Intel, where she helps shed light on human interaction with technology to inform business decisions. The annual Stephan Weiss Visiting Lectureship was launched to commemorate the life of the late artist and sculptor Stephan Weiss, husband and business partner of Parsons alumna, fashion designer Donna Karan.

PODCAMP NYC AT THE NEW SCHOOL
Saturday, April 7, 9:00 a.m.– 6:00 p.m.
The New School, Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street.
Admission: Free, register online and propose session topics at http://podcampnyc.pbwiki.com/.
The Department of Media Studies and Film at The New School presents Podcamp NYC. This free one-day “unconference” is dedicated to the sharing of information around new and social media including audio and video podcasting, and blogging. Attendees and participants include podcasters and viewers/listeners, bloggers and readers, and new media types of all stripes. The first Podcamp was held in Boston on Sept 9–10, 2006, and was organized by podcasters and technology writers Chris Brogan, Christopher S. Penn, Bryan Person, Steve Garfield, Adam Weiss, and Susan (Sooz) Kaup, with help from dozens of others. The main goals of Podcamp are to share information, network, and foster community around the many issues of portable media production.

EXHIBITION: TEN YEARS RUNNING
Opening reception: Thursday, April 5, 6:00­–9:00 p.m.
On view April 6-April 14
Chelsea Art Museum, 556 West 22nd Street by 11th Avenue.
Celebrating ten years of cutting-edge computer-driven art and design magic, the Department of Communication and Design Technology at Parsons The New School for Design presents “Ten Years Running” which will feature the work of 20 outstanding Design & Technology alumni and faculty.  The exhibit will include a curated selection of experimental film, new media installations, interactive programming, game, information, and product design.

HIGH TIMES, HARD TIMES: PAINTING AND POLITICS IN NEW YORK CITY, 1967–1975
Tuesday, April 10, 6:30 p.m.
The New School, Theresa Lang Community and Student Center, 55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor.
Admission: $8, free for all students, as well as members ofICI and the National Academy Museum.
The Vera List Center for Art and Politics, Independent Curators International, and the National Academy Museum present a panel discussion on issues of politics, race, and feminism in the art world as they emerged during the mid-1960s. The panel will look at the repercussions today of that historical moment of exuberance, when painting escaped the confines of a prescriptive modernism 40 years ago. Moderated by Katy Siegel, associate professor of art history and criticism at Hunter College, teacher at the CUNY Graduate Center and Yale University, contributing editor of Artforum, and curator of the exhibition High Times, Hard Times: New York Painting 1967–1975, panelists include Anna Chave, professor of art history at Queens College and The Graduate Center, City University of New York, and others to be announced. Presented on the occasion of the exhibition High Times, Hard Times: New York Painting 1967–1975, organized by ICI and on view at the National Academy Museum.

FINE ARTS LECTURE SERIES: JULES DE BALINCOURT
Wednesday, April 11, 3:15–5:00 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, Swayduck Auditorium, 65 Fifth Avenue.
Admission: Free.
The Department of Fine Arts at Parsons The New School for Design presents Jules de Balincourt, who has been described as a painter of new American landscapes. Comparing old Europe with America, Balincourt notes: “America has a particular type of schizophrenic dysfunction that I love. My work lives from the collision of all these cultures in one place.” Born in France, Balincourt now lives and works in Brooklyn and was recently selected by curator João Ribas as one of the seven New York-based artists for the HangART-7 exhibition in Salzburg, Austria, entitled New York Contemporary: Art Times Squared.

16TH ANNUAL SYMPOSIUM ON THE DECORATIVE ARTS AND DESIGN
Thursday & Friday, April 12–13
Keynote Address: April 12, 6:00 p.m.; Presentations: April 13, 1:00-5:00 p.m.
Target National Design Education Center, Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, 2 East 91st St.
Admission: Free. RSVP to [email protected] or call 212.849.8344.
The Master’s Program in the History of Decorative Arts and Design, offered jointly by Parsons The New School for Design and the Cooper-Hewitt, hosts its annual graduate student symposium, bringing together rising scholars of all aspects of the history of decorative arts, material culture, and design from universities across America and Europe. The Catherine Hoover Voorsanger Keynote Address will be delivered by Neil Harris, the Preston and Sterling Morton Professor of History and of Art History, The University of Chicago, who will speak on period rooms at American art museums and their relation to historical trends in the mid-20th century.

PARSONS DOES SIMS EXHIBITION
On view April 19-May 12, 2006
Opening reception: Thursday, April 19th, 6:00-9:00 p.m.
Chelsea Art Museum, 556 West 22nd Street at 11th Avenue
Museum open Tuesday-Saturday 12-6 p.m.; Thursday 12-8 p.m.
Using the world of the popular video game “The Sims” as inspiration, Parsons The New School for Design presents an exhibition of work by students in its Design and Technology, Communication Design and Illustration programs. These works combine the art forms of “machinima” (using a game engine to produce animations or films), physical computing, interactive media, 3-dimensional printing and traditional media. Organized by the Department of Communication Design and Technology, with support from Electronic Arts.

THE PUBLIC DOMAIN: FOLK ART
Saturday April 28, 3:00–6:00 p.m.
Craft demonstration: 3:00–4:00 p.m.; panel discussion: 4:00–6:00 p.m.
The New School, Theresa Lang Community and Student Center, 55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor.
Admission: $8.
As part of its series on The Public Domain, the Vera List Center for Art and Politics at The New School presents a panel discussion featuring artist Allison Smith that will explore how various agencies and governmental authorities have instrumentalized folk art for specific political purposes, which will be preceded by a demonstration of various craft, presented by approximately five artists. Traditionally, folk art describes a range of artistic expression including handicrafts and ornamental and decorative works that often portray the ordinary activities of life and the social and cultural characteristics of the culture in which they were made. Employing techniques handed down through generations, with less emphasis on the unique act of creation or the mark of the individual artist, folk art often forms a collective socio-political reflection of its culture of origin, raising questions about who owns folk art and how it defines the society or culture in which it is created.

FINE ARTS LECTURE SERIES: ROBERT BOYD
Wednesday, May 2, 3:15–5:00 p.m.
Parsons The New School for Design, Swayduck Auditorium, 65 Fifth Avenue.
Admission: Free.
The Department of Fine Arts at Parsons The New School for Design presents Robert Boyd, who premiered Xanadu, a four-channel video installation at Participant Inc., in 2006. In his exhibition, The Virgin Collection, Boyd took a satirical look at love and consumer culture’s obsession with tying the knot. Featuring pop culture ads, corporate branding, photography and an official “virgin collection gown,” he critiqued the racism and homophobia often embedded in corporate advertising. Incorporating archival footage culled from sources all over the world, Boyd’s videos tweak, condense, and re-frame modern events into seconds-long image bites, re-presenting history as MTV-style music videos. He has had exhibitions and installations in Helsinki, Mexico City, and Berlin. His work has been reviewed in publications such as Art In America, the New York Times, and Time Out New York. In 2004 he was awarded a New York Foundation for the Arts Artists Fellowship in Photography.

CONFOUNDING EXPECTATIONS: PHOTOGRAPHY IN CONTEXT 5
GILBERT & GEORGE
Wednesday, May 9, 7:00 p.m.
The New School, Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street
Admission: Free
The second of a two-part series on Photography in Context being sponsored by the Aperture Foundation in collaboration with the Photography Department at Parsons The New School for Design and the Vera List Center for Art and Politics at The New School, presents legendary British duo Gilbert & George who will discuss their remarkable artistic and personal collaboration over the last thirty-five years, from their early performance pieces to their large-scale photomontages, which have attracted both fierce controversy and enormous acclaim. This event coincides with the release of Gilbert & George: The Complete Pictures, 1971 (co-published by Aperture and Tate Publishing, London), a two-volume set that is the most extensive publication on the artists’ work ever assembled, and a major retrospective that will begin at Tate Modern, London, and tour six venues around the world. This series is made possible through generous support from the Kettering Family Foundation and the Henry Nias Foundation and public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.

Parsons The New School for Design is one of the largest and most prestigious degree-granting colleges of art and design in the nation. Parsons has been a leader in the field of art and design since its founding. Its rigorous programs and distinguished faculty embrace curricular innovation, pioneer new uses of technology, and instill in students a global perspective on design. For more information, visit www.parsons.newschool.edu.

The Vera List Center for Art and Politics is dedicated to serving as a catalyst for discourse on the role of the arts in society and their relationship to the socio-political climate in which they are created. It seeks to achieve this through public programs and forums that respond to the pressing social and political issues of our time as they are being articulated by visual and performing artists. For more information, visit www.vlc.newschool.edu.