Culture Lab Detroit Announces 2018 Program: The Crisis Of Beauty
Now in its sixth year, Culture Lab Detroit returns in 2018 to engage internationally reputed artists, inventors and filmmakers on the theme of The Crisis of Beauty. The new edition of the acclaimed cultural program will explore how beauty intersects with multiculturalism, the intricacies of gentrification, gender politics, and unbounded assimilation of technology to offer novel or previously suppressed perspectives.
DIALOGUES
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 11
The Aesthetics of Tomorrow6:00 PM Reception / 6:30 PM Dialogue
The Senate Theater
6424 Michigan Avenue, Detroit We use our visionary abilities to imagine, design, and create a better world. Historically, art has been defined by its allegiance to and rebellion from classical ideals of beauty, often in pursuit of mythology, structure, and pleasure. As we navigate an era where virtual reality challenges our concepts of authenticity, Artificial Intelligence calls into question what it means to be human, political and ecological systems place the body in a state of crisis, and the disavowal of science continues-we have to ask: how is technology shaping the future and what is the role of beauty in those processes? The Aesthetics of Tomorrow features artists and theorists working on the cusp of technological innovation: Mark Pauline is an inventor of kinetic sculpture inspired by science fiction, using his Survival Research Laboratories to explore ideas of violence and spectacle. Eyal Weizman's Turner-Prize nominated Forensic Architecture explores new uses of data to address human rights violations. Anicka Yi confronts assumptions of identity through the "biopolitics of the senses."
PARTICIPANTS Mark Pauline
Performance Artist, Founder and Inventor of Survival Research Laboratories Eyal Weizman
Architect, Director of Forensic Architecture Anicka Yi
Conceptual Artist MODERATOR Yesomi Umolu
Artistic Director of the 2019 Chicago Architecture Biennial and Exhibitions Curator at the Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts, University of Chicago SPECIAL GUEST Peter Weller
Art Historian and Robocop title role
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 12
Seeing and Being Seen6:00 PM Reception / 6:30 PM Dialogue
The Church of the Messiah
231 E Grand Boulevard, Detroit The allocation of power, formation of communities, and the shape of our individual identities exemplify the unquestionable force of aesthetics. Understanding the potential energy intrinsic to aesthetics of representation, especially as those notions serve to define a set of "ideals," we look to a global community of artists, writers, and cultural critics to visualize and redefine modes of recognition and social engagement-to help us see new ways of being in the world. Seeing and Being Seen brings together three artists whose work shows how identity is both formed and performed, and how this process can be obscured, embraced, and exalted to create a culture of possibility. dream hampton is a filmmaker, writer and social-justice organizer from Detroit whose work explores and dissects the complexities of cultural and political truths. Juliana Huxtable's multidisciplinary practice as an artist, writer, performer, and musician seeks to "canonize the saints of becoming." Finally, Amy Sherald creates a new language of portraiture to reflect the nuances of the African American experience, ranging from portrayals of everyday people to the official portrait of former First Lady Michelle Obama, which was unveiled this spring.
PARTICIPANTS dream hampton
Filmmaker, Writer, Organizer Juliana Huxtable
Conceptual Artist, Writer, Performer, and Musician Amy Sherald
Painter MODERATOR Jazmine Hughes
Associate Editor for The New York Times Magazine SPECIAL GUEST
Reverend Barry Randolph
The Church of the Messiah, Detroit
ABOUT CULTURE LAB DETROIT
Culture Lab Detroit is a non-profit organization that engages with local communities through creative partnerships, projects, and public dialogues to stimulate new relationships, artistic opportunities, and encourages action-oriented social exchange among a global network of artists, activists, and thinkers. The organization was founded in 2012 by President and Creative Director Jane Schulak.