Public Programs

Throughout the year, the Arts, Science + Culture Initiative produces a diverse range of programs that bring together UChicago faculty and students with other cultural thinkers and professionals from the Chicago area and beyond. The Initiative curates experimental situations and interactive events to generate new and unexpected exchanges between these practitioners. On topics as wide-ranging as digital culture, urbanism, medical imaging, and the cosmos, the Initiative’s public programs critically challenge scientists and artists to collide disciplinary methodologies, sparking new bodies of research and lines of inquiry.

Upcoming Events

Past Events

2024

  • Dec 4, 2024, 6–8pm | SIDEBAR: Alien Embodiments
    Desiree Foerster (Director, ASCI; Department for Cinema and Media Studies) in conversation with Michele Friedner (Department of Comparative Human Development, University of Chicago) and Amy Roder McArthur (occupational therapist and disability researcher, Northwestern University) kick off a new series of events at the Gray Center, dedicated to the interdisciplinary exploration of diverse embodiments.

2021

  • Feb 03, 2021, 7:30 – 8:30pm | FarBar: Beatriz Santiago Muñoz
    In collaboration with the Gray Center for Arts and Inquiry, a FarBar conversation on crossover applications and understandings of optics within filmmaking, physics, and neurobiology with artist and filmmaker Beatriz Santiago Muñoz, physicist Sidney Nagel (UChicago), and Ph.D. candidate in neurobiology Jennifer Ding (UChicago). 

  • Thursdays, April 8 – May 27, 5:30pm
    Physics & Contemporary Architecture Guest Lecture Series, Spring ‘21
    These 8 public lectures are part of the course PHSC11800 Physics & Contemporary Architecture at the University of Chicago and they are open to anyone interested. All lectures take place on Thursdays at 5:30 pm CST and they will be presented online as live video conferences. 

  • Oct 14, 5–6 pm | avery r. young & de deacon board
    A Moving Musical Performance: "Lead in da Watah"
    Co-presented with the Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture.

2020

  • April 2, 6pm | Ellie Ga: Film screening and discussion
    This event was canceled due to Covid-19 restrictions. 

    The Arts, Science, + Culture Initiative and the Open Practice Committee in the Department of Visual Arts are pleased to welcome artist Ellie Ga, who will present a screening version of her video installation Gyres 1-3. The screening will be followed by a discussion with the artist about her artistic trajectory and working method.

2019

  • February 11, 6pm | Slop Chest: Notes on Trade, a talk by Hannah Burnett (PhD Candidate, Anthropology) and Tucker Rae-Grant (Artist, MFA '14), with UChicago professors Shannon Lee Dawdy (Anthropology) and Matthew Jesse Jackson (Art History; Chair, Dept. of Visual Arts).

  • May 8, 5pm | Graduate Collaboration Final Presentations and Exhibition
    The Arts, Science + Culture initiative invites you to the final presentations and exhibitions of the 2018–19 Graduate Collaboration Grantees. This year’s grants were awarded to six collaborative teams of graduate students from UChicago and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC).

  • October 24, 2019, 7pm | Liam Young: Film Screening and Talk. A talk and film screening with speculative architect Liam Young, presenting works that move among the realms of architecture, film, and fiction.

  • October 24, 2019, 7:30pm | Hear in Now, a performance by the collaborative trio of original jazz-tinged avant-classical compositions.

2018

2017

2016

  • March 15, 3:30pm | Closed Loop: 3D Printing Workshop with Keeley Haftner and Will McFadden

  • April 15, 4:30pm | Lecture: Stefan Helmreich on The Water Next Time: Changing Wavescapes in the Anthropocene, South and North

  • April 27, 4:30pm | Expose Yourself! Molecular Movement, Magnifying Identity, Syntax & Songbirds

  • May 4, 5pm | Arts, Science + Culture 2015–16 Graduate Collaboration Grant final presentations.

  • May 13, 7pm | Screening: Un lac (A Lake), and Philippe Grandrieux in conversation with Raymond Bellour

  • May 14, 2pm | Screening: White Epilepsy with Philippe Grandrieux

  • May 14, 7pm | Screening: Malgré la nuit with Philippe Grandrieux

  • November 9 | Lecture: Johannes Goebel, founding director of the Curtis R. Priem Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York

2015

  • January 15, 5pm | Lecture: Carolyn L. Kane on Lillian Schwartz, Experimental Color, and Digital Art at Bell Laboratories, 1965–1984

  • ​April 19, 7pm | Lecture: Michael Light on Gardening the Human Park: Earth in the Anthropocene

  • May 5, 5pm | Arts, Science + Culture 2014–15 Graduate Collaboration Grant final presentations

  • May 21, 2–4pm | Arts, Science + Culture Compositions: Syntax & Songbirds, a composition for electronics and oboe; poetry reading by Hannah Brooks-Motl; presentation on the documentary film Fiction Addiction

  • June 4, 6pm | Lecture by Laura Kurgan: Seeing Through Data

  • October 27, 7pm | A Conversation with Thomas Hirschhorn and Yasmil Raymond on Gramsci Monument, A Living Sculpture

  • November 12, 5pm | Lecture: Giuliana Bruno – Surface: Matters of Aesthetics, Materiality, and Media

2014

2013

2012